<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>These Feelings I Got/Lucas' Season by justpolyester</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23837017">These Feelings I Got/Lucas' Season</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/justpolyester/pseuds/justpolyester'>justpolyester</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>SKAM (Netherlands), WTFock | Skam (Belgium)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Bi!Jens, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, Lucas season, M/M, Moving, Noor/Lucas as friends, SKAM Season 3, Sad Lucas, jana moved away oops, mostly antwerp</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 18:35:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>36,834</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23837017</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/justpolyester/pseuds/justpolyester</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Leaving the Netherlands wasn't a thing that Lucas would have excepted to happen. His life had been going pretty well.<br/>But then, things changed and he got torn out of his life. Moving in with his dad, someone he hasn't seen since he was four. Moving to a country so close and still so far from home. He just didn't want all of this, his plan was to hate his new life in Antwerp. But then he meets new people, friends that make him smile, that he wants to like. And there's him.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jens Stoffels/Lucas van der Heijden, Noor Bauwens/Engel Beekman(mentioned)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>79</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. one</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Saturday 9:37<br/>
Lucas eyelids felt heavy and numb as he tried to open them. One small strike of sunlight made his left eye feel like it was burning. He squinted, trying to grab a clear thought. His head weighted him down and the world around him seemed to stop for a second.</p><p>It was the day. Yesterday had been the last party in his old life. This was probably the last time he would wake up on the floor in Jayden’s room, with Kes slightly snoring next to him and Jayden throwing his bedsheets down on him. He filled his lungs, taking a deep breath as the tears were climbing up his throat. He wasn’t ready to move away, he wasn’t ready to leave Utrecht, he just wasn’t ready for this. </p><p>Until six weeks ago, everything seemed so perfect. Yes, taking care of his mother wasn’t a thing that a 17-year old boy should do, but besides that, Lucas was truly happy. He would go skating with the boys, pay more or less attention to his teachers in class and get high and drunk on a variety of parties in Utrecht. Yes, there had been the whole drama with Kes and Isa, but Lucas realised that there were things that were way more important than the feelings he had for his best friend and that he had had struggles handling them in the beginning. He was just happy that he had a stable life, with amazing friends and the freedom that he needed. </p><p>But six weeks ago, the things started to get out of control. His moms episodes got worse, one minute, she was laying on the kitchen floor and cry for Lucas’ father and in the next, she would throw anything close to her at Lucas, screaming that he destroyed her life and that he was the reason that his father left both of them. Lucas started to build up a wall against the things his moms was saying and at the same time, he took every opportunity to take care of her and to calm her down, however he wasn’t a professional, so things just kept getting more and more miserable. With taking care of his mom, he started to loose sleep at night, so he used the time he would normally use to go out with his friends to catch up sleep and to at least try to take his best shot in school, as he was graduating soon. </p><p>For about two weeks, all of this worked out okay. Kes was starting to ask questions, but he still still respected when Lucas didn’t want to talk about it, until the day his mom threw a stapler at him. It was an unlucky moment, he was coming home from school and as if she was waiting for the perfect moment, his mom was standing in the hallway, totally out of her mind, with a big stapler in her hand. She threw and reached her goal. It hit Lucas right over his left eyebrow, but for him, it was nothing to worry about, after all it was just a small cut over his eyebrow. </p><p>The first class he had the next day was P.E. and the young and way too over engaged teacher had just started basketball as a new topic and as the class was running sprints over the court as Lucas vision started to get blurry. He couldn’t remember much of that day, but Kes told him that he passed out on the court and the teacher got furious as she was trying to handle the situation. Lucas woke up on the gym floor, with everyone staring at him. The teacher told him to leave to get a check-up since he didn’t know the reason for him randomly loosing conciseness in class and after two hours sitting in the E.R., a student doctor in a teal scrub told him that the small cut over his eyebrow needed to get stitches and that he was lucky for only having a concussion and nothing worse. </p><p>After left the hospital to get back to school, the guidance counsellor called him to her office. Lucas still din’t know what had possessed him, but in a moment of weakness, he told the old lady with the yellow flower dresses and grey dutch braids about. everything. He told her about the nights he sacrificed for his mom, how he couldn’t see his friends anymore because of that and how afraid he was about not making it in class anymore because he was too tired to concentrate. After the old lady talked to his mom about everything, luckily when she was at least sort of sane, they agreed that it would be the best for everyone if Mrs Van der Heijden admitted herself to a psychiatric hospital. </p><p>The following weeks were horrible. Even though Lucas was almost grown-up, his mom was not okay with letting him liven his own for the next three months. Three months. That was the time a normal stay at the hospital would take, but according to his mothers new psychologist, it was depending on the patient, it could always be longer or shorter. Lucas tried convince his mom that he was independent enough to survive on his own, but she didn’t want to hear anything about it, so she contacted his father.<br/>
Lucas barely even knew him. The only contact they had were the way too expensive birthday- and Christmas presents he got twice a year. His dad probably thought that two not even personal presents each year would be enough excuse for leaving them. According to his mum, the decided that it was to best for 4-year old Lucas to stay with his mom, since she was totally okay back then and his friends were in Utrecht, but his father never really got over loosing his only child. </p><p>The whole situation seemed to be the perfect moment to get his lost son back and even though Lucas tried everything to stay in the Netherlands, there was no way in winning a discussion with his father, so he would be moving to Antwerp, where his father worked as a manager for some important company. </p><p>In the past two weeks, Lucas was commuting between Utrecht and Antwerp to bring the most important things over there, but he still was living with his mother, for the reason that she needed to wait for a free space in the hospital. During those weeks, Lucas had learned an important thing: His dad was barely even home, considering he needed to travel a lot to keep up the international connections of his company. On the previous Wednesday, the call came. There was a free spot for his mom, so she moved on Thursday. Everyone agreed that it was seemed the best for Lucas if he would move over the weekend to have time to get acclimatised before starting school, so he spent the last two nights in his city sleeping on a hard air mattress on the floor of Jayden’s room. </p><p>Lucas’s gaze wandered over his friends. He still remembered their faces when he told them about everything. The sadness and the tiny disappointment in their eyes. He could still hear Kes asking:”Why didn’t you tell us anything?”. Honestly, Lucas wasn’t even able to answer that question to himself. It just didn’t feel right, whining about his life problems and dragging everything down. He knew that his friend would try everything just so he could stay. Jayden and Liv offered him the empty little room in the flat share, Isa’s mom even talked to his father, trying to set an example for a child that was living alone, but nothing worked out. Lucas would leave his home. His life. He was about to take the train to Antwerp in less than two hours. </p><p>The door carefully opened and Lucas could spot Liv’s curly hair peaking through the door. “Are you guys up? I made pancakes and Ralph and Isa are already waiting” The dark rings under her eyes made her look exactly like Lucas felt. The last evening had been a lot. It would have been okay for Lucas to just hang out with his closest friends, but Jayden and Kes were convinced that Lucas deserved a bigger farewell, so they threw a huge party on the rooftop of the flat share. Lucas barely knew the people that came, but spending that last evening with such a normal thing felt really good. </p><p>The kitchen would have been too small for all six of them, so everyone took a plate and they sat down in the living room, talking about the last evening, but no one really talked about what they were actually thinking. Lucas was going to leave. </p><p>The next time Lucas checked theme on his phone, a feeling of dizziness hit him right in his stomach. 10:27. They would need to leave to get his train soon.</p><p>But Lucas just wasn’t ready to leave yet. For sure, Antwerp was less than two hours away but needing to take the train to see his friends just wasn’t the same. His whole life took stage in Utrecht and now, he was supposed to leave, to live with his dad, who didn’t even know him anymore. Utrecht created him. This city influenced his whole life. This city and the people here…</p><p>He could feel Kes’ stare on him. “What? Sorry I got bit lost, it’s just not feeling right to go”, Lucas was a bit confused, but then he realised that his phone was ringing and if he read Kes’ stare the right way, it had been ringing for a while now. “Oh damnit, it’s my dad”, he realised as he took his phone and walked over into Jayden’s room. It really wasn’t necessary to fight with his dad in front of all of his close friends. </p><p>“Yes?” “Listen, Lucas I am really sorry but I can’t pick you up at the station, there is a problem with one of the customers in London, so we need to get there. I would have cancelled it but it’s the most important customer and they would take it really personal if I would send a deputy. And we obviously can’t do it. Believe me, if it wasn’t this company, I would pick you up”, his dad said, stress in his voice like all of his plans got destroyed in the last minute, but it if Lucas was honest with himself, he had expected something like this. “Well, why do you want me to live with you  anyways? It not that you put much effort in the relationship with your son.” “Lucas, we discussed this way too much.  It’s better if you stay with me. Your mom agreed on this too, so please stop trying to change things now. I’ll try to get someone that can help you get the rest of your stuff to the apartment. I need to leave now, but we will go out and catch up when I am back, okay?” Lucas rolled his eyes, “Thanks for nothing”, he said and left the call, then he went back to the kitchen, with a heavy and bitter stone in his stomach. It seemed like his life in Belgium was already meant to fail even if on the pther hand, he didn’t want see his father anyways, so having the apartment for himself wasn’t that bad. </p><p>****</p><p>They were standing at the train station. The enormous backpack on Lucas’ shoulders felt like an anchor, dragging. down his weight and not letting him leave Utrecht. Isa, Jayden and Kes were standing in front of him. “Call me, okay?”, Kes said. “I still can’t believe you are leaving me. How am I going to control Kes without you?”  “Shut up, Jayden”. A sad grin stole its way into Lucas’ face. He was really going to miss these dorks. </p><p>The train entered the station. Lucas’ took the skateboard next to his feet. Isa pulled him into  a hug and the next second, three pairs of arms were pressing all the air out of his lungs. “I am going to miss you guys. I will just take the next train back as soon as I’m there,” he said while stepping through the door. His thoughts were going wild. He had thought about telling Kes everything. About his feelings, how he destroyed the relationship between Isa and him, but since yesterday evening, there hadn’t been any moment without Jayden around them, so he missed the opportunity again.</p><p>Sitting down on a place next to the window, Lucas watched his train leave the station and within moments, the world he was used to turned into a drifting mess of colours, made out of fields of red, pink and orange tulips and grass green meadows with sheep on them. </p><p>Saturday, 12:56<br/>
He already disliked Antwerp. During the last weeks, he had been here two or three time to take a part of his things to the way too big apartment his dad lived in, but he had barely seen the city. Now, he was leaving the train and he wished he could just turn around and go back home. </p><p>Everyone around him seemed to have a clear goal. Determined men in suits were walking towards the row of yellow taxis, probably on their way to their families after a week of work in the Netherlands or to some fancy lunch to make bounds with some super important business associates. A girl, not even three years younger than almost ran into him, as her small and slim figure made a way through the people. Her goal was a nervous boy with a bouquet of flowers between his hand, who was totally thunderstruck in the moment he saw the girl, but then his face lit up and in the moment she reached him, he lifted he girl off the floor and kissed her. The only other person that was as lost as him was an old lady with a pillow out of grey curls around her head and a basket full of groceries in her hands, but then, she saw someone across the platform and Lucas was the only person left, not knowing what to do next. </p><p>He might would have been able to find the way to the apartment by himself, Google Maps existed for a reason, but his second bag was laying heavy in his hands and his hangover from yesterdays’ party was way too bad to skate the way without getting seriously injured, so he was waiting for whoever his dad had sent to pick him up. </p><p>Waiting there, he took his phone out of his jeans. There was one text from his dad, which he ignored straight away, and a few messages from his friends. He took a picture of the big sign saying “Antwerpen Centraal” and sent it to the group chat with the boys to let them know that he had arrived. His mom had sent him some bible verses about starting a new life, which answered with a short text saying he was in Antwerp now and everything was working out. </p><p>“You are Lucas, aren’t you? Oh god, I almost didn’t recognise you, I mean, it’s been a while”, a voice said and Lucas’ gaze leaped up. In front of him, the eyes of a guy that was probably two or maybe even three years older than him were wandering down to Lucas bags, then he looked up and smiled at him. He was wearing a yellow t-shirt and with the brown curls and the brown eyes, he immediately reminded Lucas of the old pictures of his dad. His eyes were gleaming out of excitement. “Hi… Uhm, you’re Milan, right?” Lucas said. The last time he had seen the son of his dads sister had been a while ago, but his aunt had been good friends with his mother, so even after Lucas’ parents broke up, she came to visit her a couple of times, so he had seen pictures of his cousin and he knew that he had moved to Antwerp for University two years ago. “Yes, your Dad told me I should do the welcome committee, so welcome in Antwerp”, Milan said and took one of Lucas’s bags, like taking care of younger teenagers was all-day business for him. He was talking about the huge party they had at his at his flat share the other evening, but Lucas couldn’t really pay any attention to the story. His head was full of the things that happened  in the last week and he would have preferred silence to get used to the fact that this was his life now, even though he realised how much this guy reminded him of Ralph as he was following him through the station, carrying his skateboard, his backpack and the wish to catch the next train back to Utrecht on his shoulders. </p><p> </p><p>Sunday 20:45<br/>
His room was way bigger than every room he had ever lived in. The high white walls and the dark and wooden floor were a polar opposite to the blue walls, covered with posters from indie-bands he discovered over the years, pictures of him and his friends and some of his drawings and the light laminate with an old carpet that he was used too. In general, the apartment gave the impression that his father just took a magazine for interior design that was meant to be for modern and minimalistic hotels and threw a random range of white furniture with light brown accents into the space. Lucas needed to admit, the minimalist and anonymous style had something, but he still felt somehow lost in this ocean of white, geometrical shapes. </p><p>His dad had left him a full fridge and money on kitchen counter and according to his texts, he wouldn’t be back until Wednesday afternoon. Lucas had spent the his Saturday afternoon and the biggest part of today with unpacking his stuff. Besides the two bags he brought yesterday, there were two more, mostly filled with clothes, a few books he still wanted to read and the things he needed for school. Now, the white and open wardrobe was partly filled  and his books were stacking up on the slim desk. His skateboard was leaning on the doorframe. </p><p>Another disadvantage of the open interior design was definitely the fact than there weren’t many opportunities to hide his weed. Lucas didn’t know his fathers opinion on drugs and with he was brutally honest with himself, he wasn’t interested in talking about those things with his dad. He had brought his stock from the Netherlands and he wasn’t thinking about loosing it to the drug rules his dad might had, so he stuffed them in a pair of socks which he threw in one of his bags stapling the other bag over it. </p><p>He took a few plants out of the living room, so there were at leats a few dots of colour in his room. Lucas took a look at the room. He was pretty much done with unpacking and the results were actually pretty good. He had sticked some picture o the wall over the desk, the plants with big green leafs were standing at more or less random spots in his room and the stacks of clothing on the shelf gave the illusion that someone had lived here for a long time. </p><p>With his phone in one hand and his skateboard in the other one, Lucas left the apartment after he ate a bowl of tagliatelle with some open tomato sauce that was standing in the fridge. According to Google, there was the park close to the building, which was in one of the busier areas of Antwerp, was a popular hangout spot and it was early on a Sunday evening, so the possibility that he could meet some students in his age was pretty high, therefor Lucas decided to skate in the park for a bit. </p><p>He went down the big stairs and stepped trough the door of the modern building. As soon as the board hit the ground and Lucas started skating, his head got clear. Small groups of teenagers were sitting on the big lawn, eating a few things and probably sharing stories about the parties they had yesterday. Overall, the whole scene was pretty idilic and Lucas could see himself sitting here with Kes and Jayden, trying to concentrate on a drawing and sharing a joint with the guys while some of Kes’ annoying rap music was playing through a portable speaker. </p><p>Lucas could feel the stares of a group of younger girls on his back and as he turned around, they started giggling and looked away. </p><p>The comforting feeling of normality hit him and for a moment, he was just standing there, a track from The 1975 playing through his headphones and the sinking sun in his face. This whole environment reminded him of his life in the Netherlands and there was a chance that his life here would turn out pretty well too. He just needed to put a bit of effort in it and make the best out of the three months he was planning on being here.  </p><p>“Yo dude, get out of the way!”, he heard someone behind him shouting. For the tiniest part of a second, Lucas didn’t now how to react, the. He turned around and saw a guy with white hair and a Joy Division shirt on a skateboard. The teenager didn’t really made a secure impression, especially for the speed the board had, and behind him, Lucas could see a slightly smaller boy in a light brown jacket and with brown curls running towards the boy on the skateboard. Lucas grabbed his skateboard and jumped to the side and right in the moment he got out of the way, the smaller boy reached the one with the blonde hair and somehow managed to stop the board, even if that caused the other boy falling on the lawn and dragging the other one with him. They were laying on the lawn, giggling and the smaller boy looked at Lucas “Sorry man, he is learning,” then he turned towards the other boy and they started giggling again, laying there on the lawn, close next to each other. Lucas could see the blonde boy pressing a kiss on the cheek of the other boy as they got up and the other boy started explaining his boyfriend how to stop properly. </p><p>A wave of jealousy hit Lucas as he got back to the concrete to continue skating. Those boys looked so happy and Lucas would have given so much to talk to them, but his courage had left him the moment he realised that the boys were out here  on their kind of date. He threw another gaze over his shoulder and saw them there, enjoying themselves and being totally comfortable with each other and he asked himself if one day, he would be like those two boys. Then, he shook his head and continued his way through the park thinking about the couple and that he would give a world to find someone he was as comfortable with as the two boys were with each other. Maybe, just maybe, Antwerp could give him this opportunity, he thought and the first honest smile since he arrived in here made its way on his lips. </p><p>Monday 12:07<br/>
Lucas left the room of his history class, letting the huge book he just got slip into his backpack. His overall impression of the classes he had had so far wasn’t bad. The Belgian students were at the same topics as he had been in the Netherlands and even though the massive flemish accent of some of the teacher made it difficult to follow along, he was pretty optimistic about his grades here.</p><p>He went to his locker to get rid of his books. The woman in the office had given him a tiny introduction to the flemish school system in the morning, but Lucas had arrived pretty late, so she didn’t have enough time to explain him how the lockers worked and just handed him a quickly written post-it with the number of the locker, so now Lucas was standing in front of a wall of grey lockers, trying to figure out which one belonged to him. The little key in his hand was cold as he stepped toward a row of lockers. The row was numbered from 130 to 150 and a look on the post-it told him to get to locker 143, so he should find his locker here. </p><p>“Excuse me, but you are standing in front of my locker and I need to get something, could you..?”, he heard a voice next to him. “Oh, yeah, for sure. Sorry, I was just looking for my own locker,” said. The owner of the voice, a girl with red-blondish hair, a light grey turtleneck and a blue scarf was giving him a surprised look. “Are you new here? Sorry that I ask, your accent is just making me a bit curious and it’s the middle of the year, so it’s kinda unusual if someone doesn’t know where their locker is.” “Yes I am, I mean it’s really kind of obvious, isn’t it?” “Well, then welcome here. Which number are you looking for? I am Britt by the way,” Lucas showed her the post-it and she pointed to a locker directly next just had opened. “I’m Lucas,” he said while putting the two books into the locker. “Wait, we are in the same math class I think. You are from the Netherlands, aren’t you? How come that you transferred school in the middle of the year?” “I lived in Utrecht.  Let’s say there were a few family issues, so I needed to move and my dad didn’t want me to just live with a few friends, but I don’t really want talk about it.” “Well that’s okay. I guess today’s your first day here, isn’t it? If you want to, I can introduce you to a few friends of mine so you aren’t completely lost here,” she answered. “That would actually be great, I don’t know, you Belgians are a bit weird and you guy seem so, I don’t know, reserved. I think having a wingman for making friends could be helpful,” Lucas said smiling and Britt gave a warm smile back. </p><p>Lucas spent his lunch break with Britt and a few of her friends, telling stories about his life in the Netherlands and getting anecdotes of Britts life in return. Britts eyes were hanging on his lips while they were discussing which country had the better weed and Lucas noticed how she attempted to flirt with him. He was used to this, he had hooked up with so many girls, trying to prove himself that he wasn’t into Kes or boys in general, but none of them ever made his heart beat as fast as some boys did. He had tried to make himself feel something for girls, he really did, but when he looked at girls, he could see that they were beautiful, but there was not more. During the train ride, he had promised himself that he wouldn’t hook up with girls here. He was just tired of hurting them and lying to himself and he wanted to use the opportunity to discover his feelings without being scared that his friends would judge him, since they weren’t here. </p><p>He was telling a story about the city trip they did last year, when a girl with short dark hair and a fringe cut joined the group. She was wearing a short red dress with a black jeans jacket, which looked really awesome and when she noticed Britts flirt attempts, she made pretty disappointed face, which Lucas noticed immediately. Next to her, Lucas noticed a familiar brown jacket. The face of the boy looked a bit surprised, but then, he started smiling. “Wait, you are the boy from yesterday, aren’t you? Again, I am sorry, we really didn’t mean to like shock you or something,” she said. “You know Lucas?”, Britt asked surprised. “I didn’t know that his name was Lucas, I just know that Sander almost ran over him when I tried to teach him how to skate yesterday,” When Britt heard the name of the boy that Lucas guessed was the white-haired boy, she looked mad for a second, but then a slightly bitter grin appeared on her face.”Sander, skating? Why can’t I imagined that” “Honestly, it was kind of a bad idea,” the boy said. </p><p>The girl with the fringe looked at the boy: “Anyways Robbe, you didn’t come with me to talk about your boyfriend, did you?” “Well, you got a point. So I don’t know if you heard it, but Jana is already leaving next Thursday and Zoë wanted to throw a surprise party for her on Friday and Jana would be happy if you are there I guess. She wanted one of us to ask you in person, because she wants to be sure that everyone is actually coming and she said that you should text if you are coming,” Robbe said. “Thanks for letting me know, I need to check with my parents, I was actually supposed to take care of my sister, but it’s Jana, so they will find an alternative,” Britt said. Then, the boy looked at Lucas again. “If you want to, I can show you a few of the skater spots here. Take it as an excuse for almost killing you yesterday,”  Lucas couldn’t say no to that offer and Robbe and him exchanged their instagram accounts before Robbe left to meet up with his friends. </p><p>The girl with the fringe looked at Britt and they both bursted out in laughters. “I am Noor. And sorry,  but that was just awkward,” she said with tears in the corners of her eyes. “I don’t quite understand what’s so funny” “ Oh believe me, sometimes I don’t this whole situation myself,” Britt laughted. “That guy is the boyfriend of my ex boyfriend and Noors ex at the same time and they are still good friends. Sometimes I really wish I had your self control Noor! How can you not want to kill him or Sander?”, Britt said.  “But anyways, I was going to introduce you to him anyways, I think you would be a good extension to their friend group”, Noor pulled a face in the second the school bell rang and with joy, Lucas realised that he had his next class, Dutch, with Noor. He liked the girls and he was happy that he could imagine him being friends with them. He just needed to make clear that he wasn’t interested in Britt, especially since Noor didn’t seem to appreciate that little fact at all.</p><p>Monday 23:20<br/>
Boys, it’s international weed day. Jaydens text popped up on Lucas phone. He had been sitting on his bed and staring on his phone for a while now and Jaydens text tore him out of his  thoughts. In the moment he opened the messenger, a photo from Kes appeared in the chat. Jayden and Kes were sitting on their spot in the park and both of them were kissing a joint. In between them, Kes had tried to draw a stickman version of Lucas, sitting on one of the joints. Lucas needed to smile. You. Are. Missing. Here. Kes texted and Lucas send a picture of his window, showing groups sitting on benches at the sidewalk. </p><p>A new notification popped up on his screen. Sterkerdanijzer has accepted your follow request. Lucas smirked. He had been waiting for this message since he came home from school in the afternoon. Robbe seemed pretty cool and Lucas was somehow looking up to him, how confident he was  about his relationship and he was hanging out with his ex girlfriend without feeling uncomfortable with it. He didn’t knew much about him, but according to the things Britt and Noor had talked about during recess, the whole relationship thing was extremely complicated. </p><p>He couldn’t help himself and started scrolling through Robbes profile. The account was a wild mixture abut of pictures of Robbe and his boyfriend, random murals and drawings and a few bad random pictures of him and his friends. </p><p>One picture caught Lucas attention. It was a picture on the seaside, Lucas could spot a dune in the background and you could see Robbe and two of his friends. Robbe was wearing cargo pants, the boy laying in the middle was wearing a onesie that should make him seem like a bunny, but it was the third boy who caught Lucas attention. He seemed taller than the other two boys, with olive coloured skin and sharp jawline. He was wearing a dark overall and Adidas sneakers and was looking into the camera with a slightly superior grin. </p><p>Lucas didn’t know what it was, but this boy captured him. He was staring at the picture for. Two or three moments later, Lucas realised what he was doing right now. He hadn’t even arrived three days ago and he was already staring at a boy that he didn’t even knew and that was friends with the one boy that had been talking to him. He shook his head and let himself fall down into the pillows of his bed, turning off his phone and opening the book he was reading, trying to distract himself from thinking about the boy on Robbes instagram.  </p><p>Tuesday 18:33<br/>
Lucas threw a frustrated look into the fridge. Half a lemon, an open package of cream cheese, a bit of celery and an open bottle of milk were the only things left that he would at least consider to eat. When he arrived on Saturday, the fridge had been full but Lucas had at least tried to cook actual food in there last days, so the fridge just got emptier and now, there wasn’t any real food left to eat. He opened the small pantry a saw a loaf of bread and pasta, but it wasn’t really anything that he would want to eat right now or as a breakfast. </p><p>Milan had showed him the “best supermarket in whole Flanders” when he picked him up at the train station on Saturday and it wasn’t far, so Lucas took his skateboard and a bag and grabbed a 50€ from the money his dad had left him there and made his way through the streets to get to the grocery store. The streets of Antwerp weren’t crowded at all and within a few minutes, Lucas arrived at the small place. </p><p>A bunch of teenagers were sitting in front of the store, but Lucas didn’t really notice them and went inside the store. A few small shelfs were arranged into lanes, vegetables and fruits were piling up in wood boxes and the light sound of a little bell reached Lucas’ ear as he opened the door and stepped into the room. The smell of fresh bread and lasagna was tickling in his nose and in a show case next to the check out he could see plenty of fresh made food, which a lady in a colourful blouse was filling up. She gave a warm smile to Lucas as he entered and he already loved the little shop. </p><p>He hadn’t really thought about what exactly he wanted to buy, so he started gambling around a bit, looking at the colourful covers of gossip magazines, letting himself immerge into the slow and steady beat of the music on his headphones. </p><p>He was standing in front of the boxes with vegetables, trying to decide wether he wanted to have  broccoli or bell peppers with his pasta, when the woman from the class counter came over and filled up one of the empty baskets. She gave him another friendly gaze and pointed at the broccoli: ”Love, the broccoli is extremely fresh and its season is almost over,  I would take it, it will  Just give you good energy and young and handsome boys like you need vegetables to grow stronger”,  she told him, with an old honey-is voice and Lucas needed to smile, taking a bouquet of broccoli out of the basket. </p><p>The bell rang and in the corner of his eye, Lucas could see two teenagers entering the store, a tall boy with dark hair, having his arm wrapped around the shoulder of the girl, who was a bit smaller than the boy. One of  them most have said something very funny since. they were both bursting Into laughters, but that was more or less it. The two had a short conversation with the lady, who had went back bread bags and gave them to the girl. She tried to decline whatever she just got offered, but the old woman didn’t seem to be a good person to argue with and a few moments later, the two teenagers had left the store again. </p><p>Lucas.went to the counter, payed for his small amount of groceries and purchased a freshly prepared combination out of  pizza and sandwich and left the store too, not knowing that he had seen at least one of the teenagers before. </p><p>Thursday 12:20<br/>
Noor, Britt and Lucas were sitting on a table in the schoolyard. The three of them had been spending their lunch breaks together, sometimes joined by other girls or Robbe and it helped Lucas feeling at least somehow welcome in Antwerp. </p><p>They were sharing sliced apples that Britt had brought to school, Noors head was leaning on Britts shoulder and they were scrolling through the Instagram feed of an actor, Britt trying to convince the other girl that he was hot. “Look at that jawline, Noor. How can’t that be hot? And honestly, you need to start looking for someone again, you’ve been more or less lonely since Robbe broke with you. There needs to be a guy that you like. Or did you just didn’t tell ,e that you have a secret lover?” Lucas could see Noors jawline tense up, her hand grabbing her phone a bit tighter so the sharp bones got visible. “Britt, I just don’t want anybody right now. It’s not that I would run around and start kissing random dudes, would I? I just feel happy with what I have,” she sated and Lucas could hear the way this question had hurt her out of Noors voice. </p><p>“We will find you a man, won’t we Lucas?” Britt said, happy and confident, not seeming to realise that Noor wasn’t looking for a boy. Lucas attention got taken away cause in the corner of his eye, he saw him walking out of the school.</p><p>The boy from Robbes instagram. He was wearing dark red hoodie with a black jacket over it and e talked with smaller, brown haired girl. They seemed extremely comfortable with each other, the girl hitting the boys arm after he said something. Lucas was stunned and a little wave of jealousy spread in his stomach. What was so special about this guy? The boy smiled, and his gaze wandered over the schoolyard. For a second, Lucas’ and the boys glanced crossed and the stares of the boys brown eyes made Lucas heart skip a beat. </p><p>With something that Lucas read as surprise and confusion, the boy raised his eyebrows and shook his head and no-one but Lucas seemed to realised what just had happened. The girl was waving at Britt, who jumped up and walked across the open space. When she reached the two, they started a conversation. And Lucas could finally move his head,  looking directly in Noors disappointed face. </p><p>“Why don’t you just tell her?” he asked. “Tell her what? There’s nothing to tell here,” Noor answered and Lucas saw that she was lost in his thoughts. “Noor, come on. Even a blind donkey would see that you have a huge crush on her. And it’s not that she hates you” “Why would you care about that Lucas. You have arrived here not even a week ago and I bet she would give you her heart if you only made the slightest move in her direction. You are the pretty boy, Lucas. Girls like Britt will always fall for you and you probably don’t even know what you want, but you will break a break a girls heart without even batting an eyelid. So go and break her heart, then she might come  to me and cry, but I’m her friend, you know. I’ll be there for her and if she ever realises how I feel, she will just leave me, so I rather have her as a friend than not have her at all. But why am I telling you this anyways?” “ Listen, Noor. I won’t even think of ever doing anything with Britt. I see how much you like her and you guys are the first people that talked to me here, I won’t risk that. I was the guy that you described, but I take my time here as an opportunity to change, I can’t see myself breaking girls hearts, it’s making me feel horrible, okay? Honestly, if you want me to help you with Britt, I’ll do that.” Noor seemed confused, looking at Lucas but then, she pulled him into a small hug.</p><p>“Do me a favour and don’t tell her, okay? That was the first time I really talked about it,” Lucas nodded, understanding what she meant. He had felt the same with Kes and he was never able to tell him about it; he wouldn’t put Noor in the situation he was avoiding since years. He looked at the three teenagers on the other side of the schoolyard and pointed at them. “Who are those two?” </p><p>“The guy is Jens. Him and Robbe have been friends since a whole eternity. now. The girl is Jana. Britt and her were the best friends until Jens cheated on Britt with Jana and some time last, a few really weird things happened and now, they are more or less friends again.” “Wow, all of you guys have like the most complicated relationship with each other. So Jana is the girl moving, isn’t she?” “Yes”,  Noor said, obviously relieved that they were they were talking about something other than her feelings for Britt. “Are Jens and Jana still dating?” “Why do you want to know that. Is Jana your type? You don’t seem like someone that’s interested in dark haired girls ” Noor said with a smile. “Not necessarily, it just interests me. I somehow want to understand your high-school drama,” Lucas answered, feeling caught since dark-haired boys were definitely his type but something inside of him was yelling at him not to tell Noor about it, even though he knew that she wouldn’t have a problem with it, especially after the conversation they just have had and the way Noor treated Robbe. </p><p>“They are kinda on-off all the time, but I think they don’t even know their relationship status. And what is your type then? You made me curious” Lucas was thinking - Should he tell her? A part of him had enough of hiding, but he couldn’t imagine Noor being the first one to know. </p><p>The school bell took away that decision. “I guess we will never know. My math class is more important than this conversation,” he laughed, grabbing his backpack.  “Don’t think I won’t find out”, Noor yelled after him and Lucas needed to smile, entering the school. </p><p>Friday 22:47<br/>
Lucas looked at the sketch on his graphic tablet. A few months ago, he started to be interested in interior design and architecture after a random youtube documentation about Alex Vervoordt had popped up in his recommendations and since then he knew exactly what he wanted to do in his future and a ton of sketches was piling up in his room and the storage of his tablet was filling up faster than he wanted it to. Todays sketch was basically the interior of the little grocery store he had visited on Tuesday and Lucas had gotten completely lost in it. With the soft beats from one of his favourite albums playing in the back, he had lost the feeling of time.<br/>
The screen of  his phone lit up and he could see a message from Kes and little blue instagram icon. Confused, he raised one eyebrow and unlocked his phone.  Why would someone write him on instagram on a Friday night?<br/>
Sterkerdanijzer has sent sent you a message. The notification was already three hours old and Lucas was surprised by himself. Did time really pass by that fast? He usually didn’t get that lost in something. With curiosity, he opened Robbes message.<br/>
Hey, so I talked to my friends and we are meeting up on Monday to just chill and skate and they would be okay if you want join us.<br/>
Lucas face turned into a smile and his fingers were flying over the keys of his phone.<br/>
That sounds pretty chill, where are you guys meeting up?<br/>
Since he had finished his sketch, he started clicking through the insta stories of his friend. Kes and Jayden both had posted video from party and Lucas. couldn’t help but feel left out. He recognised the flat share in the background and all of his dutch friends seemed to be at the party. The story Kes uploaded showed him and Jayden sitting the kitchen counter, sharing a joint with a girl with short brown curls. Jaydens story showed Liv singing. Lucas tapped on the message had sent him and a shaky image of Jayden kissing the girl with brown curls and a u are missing popped up on the screen.<br/>
Lucas swallowed down the bitter feeling that was creeping up his throat. His friends seemed like they were having fun without him, it didn’t even seem like they were really missing him. Inside of Lucas, something was telling him that it just seemed like that and that Kes text about missing him was true, but Lucas just felt so left out and lonely right now, seeing his friends continue living and having fun while he was laying on his bed, drawing. On a Friday evening. What was he doing? What were his friends doing? Was he so unimportant that they would just continue on partying without him?<br/>
He turned onto his stomach, trying to get those thoughts out of his head. He knew that there was no reason thinking like this. It was okay to be alone, even if all his friends were getting wasted and stoned right now. And it was okay feeling awkward seeing his friends without him. But why was it so hard accepting this then?<br/>
He went back on his instagram, knowing he would regret it, but he was curious and wanted check out what the Belgians were doing. He saw that Robbe had posted a new story, which he opened immediately. Robbe seemed to be at a party too, Lucas guessed it was the farewell party for that Jana-girl they were talking about it on Monday. Lucas could see Noor in the short video, she seemed extremely happy dancing with Britt and holding a bottle of white wine in her left hand. Britts eyes ware fixed on a peroxide blonde boy that was talking with Robbe behind the phone, which Lucas. recognised as Sander, the boy that almost had hit him with the skateboard on Sunday. Behind these three teenagers, Lucas could see him. Again, as the image of him was following him, not letting him not think about him or the way they looked at each other yesterday. Lucas stared at his phone and what he saw made his stomach turn, like someone has pressed all hope out of it.<br/>
Jens and the girl from yesterday morning were sitting next to each other, she was leaning over his shoulder, almost sitting on his lap and was doing something on the boys phone. Their faces were close, she was saying. something to him and it seemed like their lips were about to touch.<br/>
Lucas wouldn’t even question it, the two were dating. What  had he. expected. anyways?  That the first guy that was his type would be gay and fall for. him immediately?He knew that that was not the way things worked.<br/>
He turned off the screen of his phone, and with a dull sound, it dropped down on the floor.  Frustrated, not knowing what was going on in his mind, he buried his head in the white pillow he was laying on, trying to think of something different than the boy and his friends in the Netherlands.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. two</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Saturday 00:11<br/>Lucas couldn’t sleep. It was early, he wanted to sleep anyways.</p><p>His head was just too full and he felt horrible thinking about his friends having fun without him, about Noor and how she would probably never get together with Britt and would end up with the same problems Lucas had had with Kes and about the guy from Robbes instagram, Jens, and the girl that was leaving soon and seemed to be his girlfriend. </p><p>Why was he like this? Why did all these thoughts affect him so much? Why couldn’t he just be okay with it and continue on living his life. Why was it so hard to come out, to accept the fact that he was gay and to show it? Why couldn’t he be like Ralph or Robbe? Why did all of this need to feel so overwhelming? What was all of this anyways?</p><p>The darkness and silence of his room were swallowing him and he felt his thoughts and himself fading fading into it. He was just here, trying to sleep, but his thoughts were running wild. <br/>Why couldn’t he just shut down his mind, sleep and continue living for a moment. </p><p>The screen of his phone slightly lit up his room. Why would anyone write him this late? It was probably just a spam mail. His phone buzzed. A message. </p><p>He was divided into two halves. He could go and check his phone, letting the blue light wake him up again or continue laying there, staring in the dark of his room and not sleeping either.  </p><p>Being not being able to sleep anyways, he rolled over to the other side of the king-sized bed and reached for the phone laying on the his floor. </p><p>Another notification from instagram. Had Robbe answered him? </p><p>Jensrolt has requested to follow you. Jensrolt wants to send you a message. He needed to rub his eyes. Why for god sake would he follow him now? And why would he want to talk with him? About two hours ago, he was almost making out was that girl and now? Lucas opened the chat and two messages appeared on the screen. </p><p>Hey…<br/>You are the new kid, aren’t you?  I am the guy Britt talked to yesterday.</p><p>Why would he want to talk with him?  Wasn’t he at his girlfriends farewell party? Thinking that there might were clues about what Jens was thinking, he watched the little clips in Jens’ story. <br/>The typical party posts with colourful lights, a picture of Robbe, Sander, Jens and two other  boys looking extremely wasted and the latest post was a shaky picture of  younger versions of Jens and Jana smiling into the camera, hugging each other and looking extremely happy, next to a picture from this evening, where the two of them were sitting in a bathtub, Janas head resting on his stomach, extremely familiar with each other. Next to it,  wtf, I’m going to miss this angel like crazy, was written in the standard. Instagram font. </p><p>Why did he write him? He seemed to be obsessed with the girl and was totally wasted by now and now he was writing him. Was Jens being nice and Lucas was seeing ghosts? Why was. All of this so complicated?</p><p>Yeah, that’s me. How are you? </p><p>He answered, asking himself how all of this would turn out and what was happening with his life right now…</p><p>Saturday 17:49<br/>“So anyways, all of them ended up totally wasted and Liv made us clean up everything at like eight in the morning, so I slept until now. But enough about the party yesterday. Tell me about Antwerp. How is everything going?” Kes’ voice sounded hollow, sounding out of the speakers of Lucas phone that was leaning on a bottle of olive oil. </p><p>Lucas had been awake until four, scrolling through instagram and waiting for Jens to answer. He was feeling like an 11-year old girl, but the fact that Jens had texted him had him go crazy and he was motivated to get to know him more. He spent at least one hour staring at the pictures on Jens’ instagram and the combination out of pictures of food that was way too fatty for Lucas and a ton of weird pictures had made Lucas smile, but also staying up way too late since he started analysing the pictures, trying to get an insight in Jens character. Now, he knew that Jens had a little sister, was interested in music and sound design and that Robbe, Jens and two were sharing a youtube channel. Lucas had watched a few of their videos and three hours had passed feeling like seconds. </p><p>Now he was standing in the kitchen, because besides the granola he had eaten after he woke up at 12, he hadn’t eaten anything and was therefor starving. Kes had face-timed him and now Lucas was making a curry and talking to his friend in the Netherlands. </p><p>“It’s going pretty okay”, Lucas said while he was chopping vegetables. “I’ve made friends with a few people and my dad is coming back late this evening, so I can’t say anything about that.” “You look hella tired, were you out yesterday too?” “No, the others were at a farewell party of one of their friends and I don’t know her so I didn’t go and besides them, I don’t know anyway and I don’t know any real party place here, so I stayed home” “You still look crazy tired. Were the two girls there too? The ones that were in your insta story the other day?” “You mean Noor and Britt? Yes they were there too, they are actually good friends with Jana, the girl who is leaving,” “Are they like your moat recent hook-up? I know that you get all. The chicks, but don’t you think that two at a time is a bit, I don’t know, radical?” </p><p>Lucas pressed his teeth on each other, tensing up through his whole body, was this really the way Kes thought of him? “God, no! I am just friends with them. Britt helped me find my locker on my first day at school and we kind of started hanging out. But they aren’t really my type and I like them way better as friends. That you think that way of me…” “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that, but you know what I am talking about”, Kes said. Lucas threw the vegetables in a pan, they started sizzling. “It’s okay, I get your point. It’s just that I didn’t stayed up to long and I am starving,  I might get a few things wrong.” Lucas said and his face lit up. The screen of his phone showed him that he had gotten new messages from Jens. </p><p>I am pretty good, sorry for not answering you. How are you? <br/>Robbe said you are joining us tomorrow and he said I live the closest to you, so he wants me to pick you up, so you don’t get to lost in Antwerp. </p><p>“What are you smiling like that?” “Oh, nothing, I am just meeting up with a few of the boys to skate a bit” Lucas answered Kes, knowing that no-one would be that happy to meet with a few people for skating, but he didn’t care. He would meet Jens tomorrow, and according to what the dark-haired boy just wrote him, they would spend time alone. </p><p>“And you think I believe that?”, Kes said. “Well choose to not believe me, but that’s everything. Have I told you about how I met the guys that I am skating with tomorrow?” Lucas said, trying to distract Kes from the fact. That he was straight up lying in his face, or he at least was not telling the full story. He would meet him. With a bit too much enthusiasm, he started staring sauce into his curry and almost spilt half of. It over the stove, which made Kes tinny voice and himself break out into laughters. </p><p>Sunday 14:21<br/>Jens text left Lucas nerves tight, curious and anxious about what was going to happen. <br/>I just left, I’ll text you when I am in your street.<br/>He was almost here.  </p><p>In probably 5 minutes, he would be standing face-to-face with the boy that he had been staring at since he had seen him on Robbes instagram. Lucas threw a look in the slim mirror next the door, trying to organise the curls that were constantly falling into his eyes. He looked out of the window and saw the sun shining, so he left his beloved jeans-jacket on the hook. He would be fine in his t-shirt. </p><p>Lucas grabbed his phone and headphones from the kitchen counter and on the way out of the flat, he took the skateboard that was leaning on the doorframe. His heart was pounding up his chest and his hands were a bit shaky as he tried to lock the door and it took him two or three tries until the lock had finally turned and Lucas was jogging down the lit up staircase. </p><p>In the second he stepped out of the door, he instantly regretted not taking his jacket with him. The air was still cold, even if Lucas saw a few girls in shorts and tops, it was extremely freezing. Should he run back upstairs again and get his jacket?</p><p>His phone vibrated and Lucas realised that he missed the chance.<br/>I can see you :)<br/>Lucas stared on his phone, then he looked top and he could see him only three houses away. </p><p>He was skating with a lot of pace, the wind blowing his brown hair out of his face, his eyes slightly closed and he made an extremely relaxed impression, with a pink hoodie laying over his left underarm and one earphone hanging down in front of him. He was silently singing along the song he was listening to and for a few breaths, Lucas felt like time just stopped. </p><p>Jens stopped his board and started smiling. “Hey new kid,” he said, smiling and Lucas could hear Jens voice shaking a tiny bit. Was he as nervous as he was? The Belgian boy’s eyes were looking at Lucas skateboard. “Did you paint that yourself?”, Jens asked Lucas and pointed at the back of the skateboard. “What? Oh, yes I did. We had a project in art class where we had to paint something meaningful, so I did that back of my board,” he said while he was looking at the scenery he had painted more than two years ago. It was basically a dune with some sea buckthorn and green dune weed, waving in the wind and on the horizon in the back, Lucas had painted a rising sun over the ocean. On the dune, Lucas had painted a boy and a girl, sitting next to each other.  He loved this picture, it kept so many memories of his friends. </p><p>“That’s impressive. I bet you will be good friends with Robbes boyfriend soon. He  is also an art boy.”  “Last time we met, he almost ran over me with Robbes skateboard, so I guess that is the perfect base for building up a friendship,” Lucas smiled. “Robbe told me that story. But honestly, I love the painting, it fits the aesthetic of your instagram,” Blood was rushing into Lucas’ cheeks. Jens had looked at his instagram. Why would he do that? Was Jens nervous about all of this too? He didn’t give the impact of a person that was nervous, no, he was calm and calculated, like he knew exactly what to say. </p><p>“Let’s go!  The skatepark is like 10 minutes away from here, at least if you skate fast and not pay enough attention to other people on the sidewalk,” Jens took his earphones and rolled them up, putting the cable into his pockets and Lucas saw a good opportunity to start a conversation. “What music were you listening to?” He said, looking exactly into Jens’ eyes. He hadn’t noticed it before, but now that they were skating down the without even the lcengst on an arm of space between them, Lucas could see how clear and deep the brown eyes of the slightly taller boy were. “No wait, let me guess. You are the rap kind of boy, aren’t you?” Lucas said, knowing that he would be right. </p><p>“Well yes, usually I listen to rap, but I didn’t feel like it. I was listening to Troye Sivan, his songs are like my guilty pleasure. Do you know him?”  “No I don’t.” “Oh you should. I will send you one of his songs when I am home. I think it’s music that you will like,” Jens said and Lucas could feel how his eyes were looking at every nuance of Lucas’ face. How could Jens be so cool, he thought, while he started regretting his choice of leaving the jacket at home even more. Goosebumps were running up his back. “  I promise, I will listen to it,” he said and he couldn’t think of something else than Jens eyes on him and the warm feeling that took over his body, even if he was freezing. Jens pulled up an eyebrow, then, with a bit less confidence than before, he said: “Lucas, you look like you are freezing.” “ Oh do I? I forgot to take my jacket but it’s okay,” he said, but the fact that his hands were shaking betrayed him. </p><p>Jens surprisingly stopped his board and threw the pink hoodie he had in his hands over to Lucas. “Take that, I can’t see you freezing.” “But then you are cold. And wouldn’t it be weird, me in your hoodie? I mean, we barely even know each other and I normally wouldn’t share clothes with friends,” Lucas said, but inside of him, everything screamed to take the light pink hoodie. “Believe me,  I don’t get cold that fast, I just took the hoodie with me to calm down my mom, she never lets me leave without a ton of clothes with me. I barely. Wear that hoodie, no-one will notice it, okay? Now take it, it’s horrible seeing you freezing,” Jens gave Lucas the hoodie and their fingers touched for a second. Lucas heart skipped a beat. Jens skin was warm and the hoodie was laying soft between his hands.</p><p>He needed to smile,  but he hid his happiness from Jens while he was putting on the hoodie. It smelled good. Like freshly baked bread and shampoo and Lucas closed his eyes, trying to. Drake everything out of this moment.  “See, it looks way better on you than it does on me anyways,”  Jens  said and he came closer too Lucas, taking his hand up to Lucas’ hair and running through it. Lucas heart went crazy. What was this guy doing to him? “Your hair was messy, now you look more than perfect”, Jens said, then he jumped back on his skateboard and went on. </p><p>Lucas shook his head. What did just happen? Then, he started following Jens. “Don’t leave me.  I thought you were supposed to take care of me so I don’t get lost,” Lucas shouted and within a few seconds, he had arrived next Jens. Jens increased his pace and they started racing down the sidewalks of Antwerp, reaching the skatepark. </p><p>Lucas could see Robbe and two other boys sitting on top of the ramps, talking. In the second Robbe saw  the two them, he started smiling. “There you are. I. Don’t have that much time today. I told you guys that this day is reserved for Sander; Boys, that’s Lucas” “Don’t even try bragging around with your sappy relationship with Sander. We all love him and we officially accept the fact that you can’t even be apart from each other for more than two hours. Hi, I’m Moyo. You are the boy that’s hanging out with Britt and Noor, aren’t you?” A boy with short  hair said. “Please Moyo, don’t even try hitting on my Ex, she deserves way better than you” Robbe said and the boys laughed. </p><p>The last boy introduced himself as Aaron and they soon started skating. Lucas heard tons of stories about Moyo failing to hit on girls, about Aaron and his girlfriend and about things that the Boysquad had experienced. He felt welcome between those four guys, but every time Jens looked at him and they exchanged short gazes, his heart went crazy. Could this be his life? With the boy making him feel crazy and a group of friends that was welcoming him extremely warm and made him happy? </p><p>Jens was looking at Lucas and something in Lucas told him that this was right, feeling the tall boy looking at him and wanting to let himself fall into all the happiness that surrounded him right now. </p><p>Sunday 19:32<br/>Lucas was laying on his bed, still wearing Jens’ sweater and staring at the ceiling. What had happened? Why couldn’t his heart stop pounding from a second? Why couldn’t he think of something else than Jens? </p><p>As if the universe was reading his mind, messages from Jens appeared on his phone. He had send the link to a music video from a song called YOUTH and another short message. <br/>I think you’ll like this song, it suits you :)<br/>Lucas started watching the video and he needed to admit he like the dreamy pop beats a lot and the aesthetic of the video suited his own. He wanton his Spotify and saved the song to his own playlist and he couldn’t stop smiling. This boy really made him go crazy and he was happy with feeling like this. Something like this had never happened to him and now, his heart was beating like the wings of a hummingbird and he realised something. He had really met Jens only today, but the few hours with him had made him fall for the taller boy, even more than he had fallen for Kes. But there was a major difference. Jens seemed to like him too. </p><p>No-one would have just shared their hoodie with another person and Jens had been staring at him just as much. But there was the whole thing with that Jana-girl. And even if Jens liked him back, they both were not out yet, as Lucas had realised when the boys were. talking with each other. But still, all of this made him so happy and an idea popped up in Lucas’ head</p><p> </p><p>You’re right. I love it :) <br/>He wrote, then he send the link to one of his favourite songs. <br/>It’s my turn now. I think you’ll like this one. <br/>The three. Minutes that passed by felt like an eternity, but then, Jens started answering. </p><p>Where’s My Love, huh? I like it but it’s not something that I will always listening too. I think it’ll join Troye on the guilty pleasure list. <br/>Lucas needed to smiled. He didn’t expect Jens to like SYML, but the song was just one of his favourites. </p><p>Your talking about the best café in Antwerp made me curious, I bet it’s not as good as you think. <br/>Lucas send the text, having exactly one thought in tieback of his head. Would it work? Jens answer didn’t take long. <br/>Oh you’ll believe me.  Let’s meet up in front of Robbe’s face tomorrow and I’ll prove it.</p><p>Lucas smiled. His plan worked and it seemed like he Jens was happy with the idea of seeing him again too. But the place Jens had given him made him begin to wonder.<br/>Robbe’s face? I mean, going to the café sounds good, but where the hell is Robbe’s Face?</p><p>Haven’t you seen it? It’s like super close to your apartment. But good, I’ll show you tomorrow. I’m picking you up at your place at 4:30 , okay?</p><p>Sounds good :)<br/>A big grin filled Lucas’ face. He had something like a date with Jens. Tomorrow. He saw a new Message appearing on his  screen.  He had sent him the link to another music video and with a. With his mind running wild and his heart beating like crazy, he watched the clip to the sappy love song, thinking about which song he could sent to the brown-haired boy that made him go crazy. <br/>Monday 12:46<br/>The Dutch teacher was standing in front of the class, trying to make the projector work so he could show a documentary about some poet Lucas had never heard anything about.<br/>Noor was sitting next to Lucas, making the grumpiest face that Lucas’s had ever thought of and doodling into her textbook. She had enormous black shadows under her eyes and Lucas stared at her, trying to figure out what had happened over the weekend that had left her like this. </p><p>Britt hadn’t been with them during lunch, so Robbe had joined them and they had talked about a photography project the art school was doing. Sander had asked Noor if she wanted to model for his project and now Robbe was trying to convince Noor to make time between her dance practices. </p><p>She had looked pretty okay outside, but now that they were sitting in the classroom, Lucas could see that she wasn’t okay at all. “Noor, do you want to talk about it?”  he whispered,  trying not to gain the attention of the students around them. “There’s not much to talk about”, Noor said and pressed her pen into the page of the book. “You can’t tell me that, you looked like you stayed up  the whole weekend and someone stole your coffee and then, someone took away everything that you like. Come on Noor, it will be easier if you talk about it. It’s about Britt, isn’t it?”</p><p>“It’s just… You know on Friday, at Jana’s party, she met this guy, Hugo or something like that, a total poser that probably has a new girl every other week and he talked with her and now she is totally into him and she was talking about him all Saturday and I just can’t sit there and watch her giving her heart to him, because I know that he will just let her fall again and then I am the person. that is supposed to handle the whole situation, to cheer her up and comfort her, even though I am way worse at handling my feelings and I just can’t do all of this. It has me going crazy and laying awake all night.”, Noor said and Lucas saw tears in the corner of her eyes. </p><p>He pulled her into a hug, one eye on the teacher since he didn’t want to get called out in class.  “Hey, I can’t say that everything is going to be fine, because we don’t know how all of this will end, but I can say that Britt really likes you and that I am there for you if you ever need someone. We might not know each other for. A long time, but I see you and I think that you are amazing and if Britt doesn’t see that, there’s gonna be someone else who sees it, okay?” </p><p>Noor wiped the tears out of her eye and looked at Lucas. “I guess so. I’m sorry, it’s just that things are hard right now.” “Listen, we will do something to distract you this week, okay? I don’t know, you can show me your favourite spots in Antwerp or we can have picnic in a park or cook something together. Whatever you want. But please, don’t let all of this get close to you, okay? I don’t like seeing my friends sad.” Noor let a sad smile lit up her face and looked at Lucas. “How was your weekend? Enough from my crying, you look so happy.”  “Actually, there wasn’t much going on this weekend I guess I am just happy. I mean look at the awesome friends I Have”, Lucas said, a bit too loud so the teacher gave him strict gaze, but Lucas couldn’t care less since the sappy comment had made Noor smile.</p><p>He felt a bit guilty for not telling her about Jens, but the moment just wasn’t right and the whole thing with Jens wasn’t even sure, but he promised himself to tell her soon, since he really, really liked the girl with the dark hair and red lipstick and the story of Jens and him was probably something that would help her not to think about Britt the whole day.</p><p>Monday 16:39<br/>Robbe’s face turned out to be a huge mural that Sander had painted after Robbe and him had been in fight and Lucas was more than impressed by it when he saw it. Him and Jens were standing in front of it, staring at the different shades of orange and red on the brick building. </p><p>“So that’s everything I need to do to get into a relationship here? I knew that Belgians are weird, but asking people to date them by breaking into others property and painting each other five times as big as you actually are is a whole new level. I should try that,” “It’s actually a move. That only Sander would make, but I think whoever you would paint would be more than happy about it”. The two of them were standing close together, it was almost too close for Lucas, since their hands were almost touching whenever one of them moved a bit. </p><p>“Okay, if you had to do something like that, like I don’t know, make a big move towards a girl, what would you do?” Lucas was screaming inside of him, why had he done that? Why had he added the “girl” part. Now Jens would definitely think that he was straight as hell and. Only wanted to share tips about getting a girlfriend. “If there was someone that I would like, I think I would say it through music. Write them a song or send them a playlist with lyrics that I connect to them. But I wouldn’t say that it would be necessary to be a girl.” </p><p>Lucas needed to swallow. Did he really just come out to him? “So you like girls and guys?” “I guess so. I mean, I’ve never dated a guy, but if I would meet the right one, I wouldn’t say no, you know?”</p><p>He liked guys. He liked guys and he had just told him. And now he was looking him straight into his eyes. The thing Jens had just said gave him chills and he could hear his own heartbeat,  crystal clear in his ears. Lucas didn’t know how long they were standing there, the taller boy looking him straight into his eyes, making his heart beat like crazy and his mind run wild, but Jens broke the silence. “So I wanted to prove that we got the cafés here, didn’t I? Are you coming?” Jens asked and left Lucas standing there, completely confused. </p><p>The small café was cute and Lucas’ loved the cozy interior and he already saw himself drawing this when he would be back in his room.The two boys were standing in front of a glass showcase with tons of baked goods in it. The vibrant colours of macarons and fruit cakes were alternating with the different shades of brown and beige from buns and chocolate cakes. The smell of roasted coffee was filling the air and the voices of the visitors mixed into a harmony out of voices. </p><p>Lucas needed to admit,  this place was really awesome, but he wouldn’t show Jens how stunned this place left him. “So you, as a café-connaisseur, what would you recommend me?” “Depends on wether you like sweet or savoury food. Their sandwiches are awesome, but I can also recommend the cinnamon buns and the macarons and if you like chocolate, you should  try their brownies. And the coffee is just good, it doesn’t really matter which one you take, you’ll like all of them.”</p><p>Lucas couldn’t really decide, but Jens knew the place, so he ordered something for both of the boys. After they had payed, took place on two extremely cozy chairs in the upper level of the café and placed their food on a little coffee table. Jens had chosen small cinnamon buns for himself and the brownies for Lucas and he smiled at Lucas. “And, that do you think? Best café in the whole world?” “It’s okay,” “Just wait until you try your food”</p><p>Curious, Lucas took a bite from the fudge brownie and he knew that his face would betray him, telling Jens that this place was pure heaven for Lucas. “See, I told you that this place is awesome. I think they mix drugs or something into the food, that’s the only way it can be so good.” “Honestly, I’ll blame you if I come home addicted to brownies from here. How do they do that?” “I don’t know, but I knew that you would love it you seem like a sweet person. It suits you at leats as much as thee whole art boy thing.” Lucas needed to smile and took took a sip out of his cup, burning his tongue and making Jens burst into giggles. “I should have warned you,  their coffees are extremely hot, you should wait before you drink them” “Hot and sweet. That’s an interesting combination. I like it”, Lucas said, slowly sliding his hand towards Jens’ hand, which he had noticed laying on his side of the table. </p><p>Their fingers were touching, Lucas could feel the warmth of Jens’ fingertips on his, but then Lucas changed his mind and grabbed one of Jens’ cinnamon buns, grinning shiftily. He bit in it and smiling. “Wow, I might admit that this place is pretty good. Especially the cinnamon buns.” “Wow, that was absolutely outrageous.” Jens smiled and took one of Lucas’ brownies.  “But I like the idea.” He said, with a triumphing smile in his face. </p><p>They talked. About music, about school, about places they wanted to visit and time flew by. They were just sitting there, their feet touching under the table and shyly starting to knot each others finger into their own, Lucas talking about how he would love to go backpacking in Bali after school, as Jens phone started to ring. </p><p>His ringtone was YOUTH and Lucas immediately needed to smile, thinking about the collection of sappy songs they had sent each other yesterday. Jens answered the call and Lucas saw his expression. turning, he seemed to be extremely disappointed and at the same time, he looked like he just had realised something extremely important. He put down his phone and looked at Lucas, guilt in his  eyes. “Fuck, I’m sorry, like honestly, I don’t want to leave, but I promised Jana to help her and her mom move the last bit of their things. They are leaving on Thursday and I really can’t cancel that. I promised her I would help her and I think she is going to be extremely mad if I am not there. Really, I would love to stay…” </p><p>Jens grabbed his jacket and his phone and threw another sad gaze at Lucas, then he hurried out of the café and Lucas felt like an abandoned puppy, sitting there with half a mug of cold. coffee, staring at the place Jens had been sitting on. </p><p>Tuesday 14:24<br/>The schoolyard was filled with older students who were enjoying their recess. Lucas, Robbe and Noor were sitting on the back of a bench, Robbe was waiting for the boys to join him and him and Noor were discussing something but Lucas didn’t really pay attention to them, he was busy scrolling through his instagram feed and looking at at least a billion of orange pictures that his friends had uploaded yesterday. </p><p>He felt a head reaching over his shoulder and saw Noor’s straight black hair right next to his own face.  “I told you dutch people are weird Robbe, they are throwing a huge birthday party for their king and everyone is wearing orange.” “Wow Koningsdag is like one of the best things ever. Everybody is getting wasted and you just have fun and people dress ridiculously.” </p><p>Lucas sighed and nostalgia hit him. One year ago, all of it had started. He had been making out with a ton of girls, trying to prove that he wasn’t gay and at the same time, he had downloaded Grindr. He soon realised that online dating wasn’t his thing. He had had one nice conversation on the app but the boy he was talking to had shamelessly ghosted him and since then, her had never completely thought about all of it again.</p><p>“So, are you coming?”, full of expectation, Robbe was looking at him. “Where? What?” Lucas was confused. “I told you he’s completely lost today,” Noor said “Sander is celebrating his birthday on Friday and he asked us to tell you that you should come too, so are you up to having a real party and not that orange patriotic stuff you guys have?” Noor was smiling, looking at him. “Yeah, why not?” </p><p>“Great”, Robbe was picking up his back since Moyo, Aaron and Jens were coming out of the building. “We are celebrating at my friends flat share, I’ll send you the details later okay?” Lucas nodded, but his  mind was again miles away, since Jens was staring at him, regret in his eyes. Lucas threw a gaze at him, trying to understand what was going on. Jens had more or less dumped him for Jana, but. now, he was staring at him again. Lucas couldn’t stop thinking about yesterday. About all of it, about how their hands touched, about Jens’ smile and the warmth of the café around him, but also about the bitter feeling he had when Jens had left, just him sitting there, staring on the empty chair. </p><p>Noor softly hit him in his side. “Earth to Lucas, are you there?” “Uh, yes, sure” “Okay good, I need to copy Dutch from you or the teacher’s going to kill me”, she said and Lucas unzipped his backpack, giving Noor his folder and explaining her his. Interpretation of the poem.  </p><p>Wednesday 15:30<br/>Lucas didn’t know what he was doing here. He just didn’t know what was happening to him. </p><p>Jens had apologised to him during lunch, he had pulled him out of the hallway, away from the chatters of the other students, trying to explain that he was honestly sorry and then he had invited him to come over to his place. Since it was a Wednesday, so a short day in school, Lucas had went back to his own place, thinking wether he should go or not, he had laid on his bed, staring at the ceiling for at least half an hour, and now, he was standing in front of Jens house, the pink sweatshirt in his hands and his  hands were shaking again. </p><p>The place Jens’ family lived in was cute, a house build out of dark bricks and balconies with vibrant flower boxes on the cast-iron railings. Light curtains were concealing what happened behind the window and Lucas was thinking about turning around and just going home. He had met this boy not even a week ago and he was already not capable of not thinking of him anymore. Lucas tried to organise his thoughts. It probably wouldn’t end that bad, they could talk a bit and then he could make up an excuse to leave, since even if Jens made his heart beat higher, Lucas didn’t want to build up close relationships. He was only here for about two months, wasn’t he? </p><p>He had realised that he actually wanted to hate Antwerp, looking at the pictures of his dutch friends hanging on the wall in his room. He really didn’t wanted all of this. He wanted his life in the Netherlands. The second he arrived here,  he had promised himself to dislike this place, But he was still here, in front of his house, with his sweater in his hand. Why was all of this so complicated? Why did all of this needed to be so confusing?With his shaky hands, Lucas rang the doorbell. </p><p>A dog was barking and a few seconds later, the door opened and a girl, probably seven or eight. years old, was standing on the opposite side of the door. She was obviously struggling with holding a big golden retriever on its collar,  the dog was jumping up and down with excitement, trying to reach Lucas, but the little girl seemed to at least partly win this battle by telling the dog to stop. He threw a closer look at the girl. She was the girl from Jens instagram, his little sister and with the dark hair and the same deep brown eyes, he would have known tit was his sister without having seen the pictures on Jens’ instagram account.  </p><p>“Be silent, Artemis”, the girl said and the dog started to calm down, pressing its body towards the girl which made her laugh. Lucas needed to smile. They had named the dog after a greek goddess. He remembered his young self reading the Percy Jackson books and he could somehow imagine that Jens had read them too and a young Jens had given the impulse for this name. </p><p>“Hi, are you one of Jens’ friends?” The little girl asked, throwing sceptical gazes at Lucas who was torn out of his thoughts once again. “I guess so, he to come over. Is he here?” “Well yes, him and Jana are in the kitchen because I asked them to bake with me. Did you know that Jana is leaving? I don’t want her to leave, she’s making Jens happy and she’s so nice to me. Not like the other girls that were with Jens, you know? Do you know Jana?” </p><p>Jana was here. Was Jens serious? He wanted to make up for dumping him for Jana on Monday and now Jana was here? And the way the little girl talked about Jana, there was no doubt that Jana and Jens were dating, wasn’t there? What was Jens doing with him? </p><p>“You know, if Jana is here, I don’t want to disturb them. Can you give Jens his sweater? He gave it to me on Monday and will know that I was here if you give it to him,” Lucas was disappointed, a bitter and cold feeling in his stomach, as he handed over the pink sweater. Why did he think that Jens had liked him back? He had probably just tried it out and now he was baking with his girlfriend, like they had been married for 20 years, owning a house and a dog. </p><p>A second face appeared in the doorframe and Lucas wanted to scream. It was her, her brown hair up in a messy bun, with flour on her green pullover, smiling at him. “Hey, you are Lucas, aren’t you? I’ve heard a lot about you. Sorry, I know that you two wanted to meet up, but I’m leaving tomorrow and I couldn’t go without saying goodbye to my favourite little chief here” she pinched into the cheek of the small girl, who started giggling “Do you want to join in? We’re baking appelflappen and Jens is really good at it. He said you have a thing for sweet stuff, you’d definitely like them.”</p><p>Was he serious? Why did this girl know everything? Anger was building up in Lucas, all of this was just crazy, what was he doing here anyways? </p><p>“No, you guys should totally spent your last hours together, I’m sorry that I interrupted you guys, I have a ton of homework to do anyways,” he took his skateboard and wanted to. leave, but. Jana was looking at him: “Are you sure, you wouldn’t disturb us or something, I actually wanted to get to know you, you should seriously stay” Lucas threw a bitter look at Jana: “It was nice to meet you Jana, you’re moving to New York, aren’t you? I hope you have a great time there.” “Wait”, Jana  tried to stop him, but Lucas had already left the entrance and was making his way home, confused, mad and missing his home. Antwerp wanted to destroy him, he thought and he just wanted to catch the next train back to the Netherlands. </p><p>How could one guy make all of him go so crazy, give him this warm feeling and shaky hands in one moment and in the other, make him mad and confused? Lucas shook his head, all of this was too confusing and exhausting for him. </p><p>Thursday 18:02<br/>The art school Noor was taking dance classes at was way more impressive than their own school. Lucas was standing in the lobby of the old building, looking for Noor in between of all the  students who had just finished class. In between of all this, he suddenly saw a white and a dark black shock of hair. Noor, wearing yoga pants and a bright red sweater over them, came out of the mass of students, a boy with a black sweater and bright blonde, almost silver hair, walking next to her. </p><p>“Lucas, this is Sander. I don’t think you have like really met,” ; Noor said and the boy smiled. “Sorry again for last time. Robbe has told me about you. Are you coming tomorrow?” “Yeah I guess so.”</p><p>They talked for a bit, but then Sander left to finish one of his school projects and Noor was smiling at Lucas. “So, the ultimate thing to do in Antwerp is definitely to watch tourists trying to find out where to go. And it’s even more funny because it’s raining today.” “Wow, I didn’t expect you tube so evil.” “Well, I’m full of surprises. Are you coming?”,  Noor said as she was leaving the building.</p><p>With Noor’s scooter, the two of them went to the Grote Markt , the big marketplace of Antwerp, and even Lucas didn’t want to admit it, watching the groups of foreign visitors with their huge umbrellas and maps which they were looking the wrong way was extremely funny. They were taking group pictures in front of the town hall. </p><p>Noor and Lucas sat down in a restaurant at the marketplace and soon, two plates with tacos were standing on the table. “How’s tomorrow going to be? I mean, are there like any Belgian etiquettes that I could screw up at the party?”, Lucas said while he was trying to stop the guacamole from running out of his taco. “You’re definitely worrying too much, Luc. It’s just gonna be a gathering with a few friends and people will get drunk and high and that’s more or less it. And art might turn out to be a bigger party than expected because big parties are always good, especially. If you want  to  surprise. someone, but that is it. You should stop  worrying, the boys love you and when you meet the other girls tomorrow, they will love you too.” </p><p>It felt like something had hit Lucas right in to his stomach. Jens was going to be there too. He had avoided him the whole day, confused and mad, not knowing what he was supposed to do. He felt used, like Jens was curious to see wether he liked boys and since Lucas wasn’t planning to stay here, Jens might have seen the perfect opportunity to try it and then tell his girlfriend about it. They probably had been laughing at the story of the dumb dutch boy that would easily go on a date with Jens. </p><p>“Ground control to Luc, are you still here? You don’t seem happy,” Noor was looking at him, worry in her eyes, “It’ll be fine, I swear” “Oh it’s really nothing, I just, I don’t know, I feel like Antwerp is trying to punch me in my face right now. I kinda wish I was home right now,” Lucas was staring at his fingernails. “I don’t know what happened, Luc, but you told me we should go out because I was feeling like shit and now you are feeling like shit too, that can’t be productive. Do you want to  talk about it?” “How do you know that you are in love Noor?” “I don’t know, I can’t stop thinking about the person and I get jealous when they talk with someone else, no matter who it is. And I only see the good things in them and I could be with them the whole day, without even thinking about something else than just them. And talking to them just feels right, like someone took all the worries away from your shoulders and you can just be happy and feel warm for a moment. But that’s not the topic, is it?” Noor was scrutinising Lucas, trying to read the emotions in his face, “Or is it? Is there someone in your life?” </p><p>“Probably. But they wouldn’t want me anyways I guess,” “Stop saying that Luc, you have everyone falling in love with you and you didn’t even arrive two weeks ago. Whoever it is, she will fall for you and you don’t even have to try for  it.” Lucas needed to swallow. He wanted to tell her, he really did, but something in him was holding it back. What would she think? She would probably just leave him at the side, since she already had Robbe. Why should he tell it someone anyways? It wasn’t important anymore, was it?</p><p>“Okay, I don’t believe that, but let’s talking boat something else okay? How are dance classes going?” “Just because I respect your boundaries, it doesn’t mean that I won’t find out, okay? But dance it going pretty good,” Noor explained Lucas the different things they were doing at her dance classes and Lucas listened, distracting Noor from Britt and himself from Jens and he was happy that he had found Noor, since she was making Antwerp a little bit better for him. But thinking  about tomorrow still made his stomach turn. </p><p>Friday 22:22<br/>Lucas had been surprised when it was Milan that had opened the door to the place Sander’s birthday party was taking place. The moment the others had realised that they were related, Robbe and a blonde girl called Zoë had started telling Lucas stories living together with Milan and Lucas had enjoyed the evening so far. Now, that more and more people that were not even really friends with Sander or anyone else that had been here from beginning had arrived, Lucas and Noor were sitting on top of the kitchen counter, Noor sipping on a glass of wine and Lucas playing with his bottle of beer. </p><p>“You don’t need to take care of me, Luc, if you want to join the boys just go ahead, I know other people here too,” “Do you want to get rid of me or what?” Lucas asked and his gaze went for the boysquad. Robbe was leaning on Sander’s side, Aaron and a blonde girl Noor had introduces to Lucas as Amber were cuddling on the couch and Moyo and Jens were just joining the group, bottles of beer for everyone in their hands. Zoë and Milan were sitting with the group and the last person that was sitting with them was a girl with brown curls, if Lucas remembered it the right way, her name was Luca. </p><p>“Honestly, no. You should definitely stay here, I feel like I am going to get way to drunk tonight” “Well I wasn’t planning to go anyways,” Lucas said, looking at Jens who had just emptied his fourth or probably fifth bottle of beer for the evening. “Well that’s good. Look what Britt just send me,” Noor said between two hick-ups and put the display of her phone right in front of Lucas’ face. The picture Britt had send was shaky and a bit blurry, but Lucas could see that it was picture of Britt kissing the cheek of a boy with short, blonde hair and I smile that made Lucas instantly hate him. “Is that the Hugo-guy?” “Oh, they seem to have a great evening. He took her out for steak” Noor’s voice was shaky and Lucas could see tears rising into her eyes again. “How long has all of this been going?” “I don’t know, I realised there was more than friendship after Robbe broke up with me,” Noor said and Lucas did the math in his head. According to what Jens had told him on Monday, Robbe and Sander had really started dating in December, so it had been ”Six months? And you didn’t tell her?” “Well, it’s just that I can’t. And I bet you did the same thing in the past” “My past will stay an unsolved secret for you, Noor” "You really think?”</p><p>Noor jumped off the counter and with a few insecure steps, she arrived next to the big cluster of teenagers from their school, since Sander had shouted that the two of them should join them. Noor let herself fall next to Sander, leaning on his other side and Lucas was about to jump down the counter and as a guy in a well-known dark red sweatshirt appeared next to him. </p><p>“Can we talk?”</p><p>Lucas needed to take another breath since he hadn’t realised how much Jens was making his heart beat higher. The taller boy was standing next to him, the blue light of the fairy lights that were hanging on the shelf were accentuating his sharp jaw and his dark eyes gave Lucas chills. But there was another thing that he noticed, that was different from the things that already had taken his breath on Sunday and Monday. Jens was smelling like  he had downed an entire brewery and that little fact gave Lucas even more chills. </p><p>“What do you want Jens? You wanted to try something new to, I don’t even know, spice up your relationship with Jana or something like that and you chose me for it. And now, you are probably feeling bad for it and want to apologise, but what you did is still shit. And now leave me, okay?” Lucas could feel the anger crawling up his throat as he hissed the few sentences to Jens, trying not gain any attention from the others. </p><p>“Wait, Lucas, that’s not how it was. Can you let me explain it?”  Jens was trying to grab his wrist, but Lucas had drunk way less than Jens, so he managed to escape him. He didn’t want to hear it. Everything was making him mad, confused and he felt dazed, like someone had taken away his ability to control his life, like someone really wanted him to hate Antwerp. He ignored the things. Jens was saying, he just wanted to either get completely wasted or out of this place.</p><p>He downed the rest of his beer and went over to the others, grabbing another one out of a crate of beer that was standing on the wall. He sat down next to Noor, who looked at him with worry in her eyes, but didn’t ask him what was wrong since too many people were around. Listening to Milan telling stories out of his life that seems to entertain the whole squad, Lucas was sitting there, getting wasted and feeling the sorrow in Jens’ stares, but it was nothing Lucas wanted to care about right now. All of this hurt and confused him too much and his only wish was to go back to the Netherlands.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. three</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Saturday 17:21<br/>The risotto on Lucas’ plate was cold and he was picking on the food, pushing it from one side to the other. Rain was splashing against the big windows of the restaurant and a river out of water ran down the street. On the other side of the table, Lucas’ father was cutting a steak and scanning every bit of Lucas’ face. </p><p>“So how was yesterday? I heard you coming home pretty late,” Lucas didn’t want to answer and he stared out of the window, mumbling more to himself than to his father. “It was good, we celebrated the birthday of one of the boys that I met during the last weeks,” his dad looked at him, rising up one eyebrows. Lucas observed two girls running over the street, trying to escape from the water that was falling down the sky. “Lucas, I know you  don’t want to be here but you can at least try it,” his father was looking at him and Lucas would have loved to just leave the place. </p><p>“It’s not that I am going to stay here forever and I made a few friends, so don’t worry about me, it’s not that you normally care,” Lucas bit his tongue, trying not to say more things he would regret later. “I know you are upset, but can’t we use the opportunity and at least try to get closer again? You are still my son Lucas,” Lucas didn’t want to hear it. All the things were just too much right now.</p><p>Lucas just shook his head. He didn’t need all of this right now. It would have probably helped him to get wasted with Kes and Jayden, bot thinking about all the  things that were happening, but that just wouldn’t work out, would it? </p><p>“By the way, I don’t know if. That makes it any better, but I talked to the mum of that Isa-girl you told me to talk to,” Lucas looked up, hoping he would get at least some good news today, “and she somehow convinced me that there are enough people that would take care of you if you went there, so I thought you could go and stay in Utrecht for next weekend. You could visit your mom and I would trust you to stay at your place or the friends’ you stayed at before you came here. The train would leave here at like six in the evening on Friday and you could come back during Sunday. Take it as a peace offer from my side, okay?” </p><p>“Really, like, I could really go there?” “Not every weekend, but I think you need to spend time with you friends and if it makes you happy, you are free to do it” Lucas needed to smile. “For sure.” He would be able to see his friends and an idea appeared in his head, probably, there was someone in the Netherlands who could help him understand the whole thing with Jens, why he was playing. With him and why he was is hurt by it. His dad’s  idea had really saved his day, probably the whole week, and even though he was still mad and confused, there was at least a bit of hope for him. </p><p>Monday 15:55<br/>The school bell rang and with relieve, Lucas closed his physics book. Putting the chair on top of the desk, he looked at the notes on the white board. Physics was a pretty chill class, they didn’t get many exercises and Lucas understood it way better than he had in the Netherlands. The teacher smiled at him. “Have a good week,” Lucas replied to the teacher when was standing next to the door, giving work sheets to his students. The dutch boy took his headphones out of his pockets, fighting a way to his locker through the hundreds of other students that were leaving the school. </p><p>Lucas didn’t really focus on the things around him, he was thinking about the weekend. His dad’s idea had changed his plans, but Lucas was more than happy that he would see his friends again. He had only wrote Isa, he was thinking about surprising the boys, just appearing at the party that was planned for Friday. Suddenly, he ran into something and he felt his phone falling out of his hand, meeting the floor with a loud bang. Lucas flinched as he heard the noice, hoping his beloved phone wasn’t totally wrecked. </p><p>“Holy fuck, I am sorry”</p><p>Lucas could have screamed. For sure, he had to run into him. What was this? A coming-of-age movie? Jens was standing in front of him, his hair messy, shadows under his eyes and wearing a simple black T-shirt, his backpack only on one shoulder. </p><p>Before Lucas even realised it, Jens had grabbed the phone from the floor, holding it towards Lucas. “It seems fine,” he was trying to avoid Jens’ gaze as he took the phone, but he couldn’t ignore the look Jens was giving him. He seemed as least as confused as Lucas was and he could almost see the inner conflict Jens was having right now. As he took his phone, he couldn’t ignore the fact that their hands were touching once again. </p><p>Jens’ hand felt warm and Lucas could feel his pulse getting faster. “Lucas, can we..?” He wanted to talk. Again. Lucas bit his lip, thinking. Maybe, Jens had a logical explanation for all of it. He really wanted to believe it, he wanted to see the good, but his worries were once again stronger. Jens mould probably confirm that he had played with him. He would laugh at him and tell everyone hoy he tricked the dutch boy into falling for him within less than two weeks. It was obvious that he like Jens, Lucas knew it, and he really couldn’t imagine Jens liking him back. Not after what Jana had told him on Wednesday.  Why would he like him? He was just the dumb boy that had invading the friend group.</p><p>All those thoughts were coming up in Lucas mind and even if he wanted to, he couldn’t just mute all of his worries. Jens was looking at him, straight in his eyes and Lucas knew that he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t hear whatever the boy with the brown curls was going to tell him. He looked down on the floor, shook his head and left, walking fast, letting Jens standing in the middle of the hallway. </p><p>He wanted to get away from here, everything was too much for him right now. He tossed his books into the locker, ignoring Britt who stood in front of her locker, leaving the school with tears wetting up his eyes. Since when was he like this? Since when did the tiniest conversation make him go crazy and scare him so much? Since when couldn’t he face another person without almost crying? </p><p>A text from Robbe lit up his screen.</p><p>We were thinking of going skating later, wanna join?</p><p>Lucas needed to smile, bitter. What kind of irony had his life? He just had ran away from the boy he liked and now he was invited to see him and all of his friends again. Really? He shook his head, swallowing down the massive frog in his throat.</p><p>He opened the lock of his bike that was standing in front of the school, seeing the boys standing in front of the school, Jens staring at him, Robbe hugging Sander who had appeared in front of the school, Moyo and Aaron laughing at something. Lucas wanted to belong to the boys, he really liked them, he felt like they could make them feel home, but now, all of this seemed so far away, he thought as he left the street, wanting to scream as the tears were crawling up his chest again, the wind making his eyes burn. </p><p>Tuesday 06:12<br/>The light of the rising sun was shimmering through his curtains. His head was pounding, his were sticky and he had struggles opening them. Lucas had been laying like this for at least 20 minutes now, staring at the ceiling. The time on his alarm clock made him bury his head in the pillows, pulling his cover over his head. He woke up more than one hour before he had to actually get up. </p><p>Lucas mumbled something in his pillow, he didn’t really knew what it was himself, he was just trying to let his anger go. Even if he just woke up, his mind was already full, still. Trying to process. The things that had happened with him during the last two weeks. He just couldn’t think of anything else and it was driving him crazy, not knowing what to do about all of this. He pushed his sheets on the floor and suddenly, his room was disturbing him. The clothes laying on the floor, the not perfectly stacked school books, the skateboard on the floor and the charger of his graphic tablet sticking out of the drawer under his desk. </p><p>He got up out of his bed, pull the curtains open and once he had opened the big window, a breeze of cold air made him shiver but also smile. The air smelled like spring and the rising sun made Antwerp glow in shades of orange and red, reflecting on the river that wrapped itself around the blocks. Lucas hadn’t looked at Antwerp like this, at dawn, from his window high above most of the buildings and the new perspective took his breath. </p><p>He grabbed his phone, taking a picture of the scenery. Another breath filled up his lungs and he took his headphones, letting his music carry him through his room. With good mood, he started to fold his clothes, humming to the beat of the song. Within less than a minute, his floor was clean and his clothes were stacking up on the shelf again. Softly, he pushed his books back into a straight line and rolled up the charger placing it in the drawer. </p><p>He looked over his room and it felt relieving seeing it organised again. His skateboard. Was still laying on the floor, but besides that, everything seemed calmingly organised. He sat down on his bed and realised that bringing order back into his room had not only made him feel better,  but his thoughts were way clearer now too. </p><p>For sure, it sucked that he  wasn’t with his. friends right now, but he was the one making new memories and meeting a ton of new people. He couldn’t really imagine a life without Noor anymore, without the talks with her and Britt during lunch and recess. It felt so natural, seeing them each and every day, having the two girls making him smile. Still, he missed the Netherlands and his friends there, but  he realised that he could probably have both, living here and still experiencing his life at home, especially since he could go home for the weekends. </p><p>The thing with Jens made him insecure, he didn’t know how to work it out, especially since he couldn’t do anything but run of when he was facing him, filled with worries and doubts, but it was only one little thing, it couldn’t be that bad, could it? </p><p>Thursday 20:03<br/>The air was fresh, but not as cold as Lucas had expected when he had left half an hour ago. The park was full of people, families on a walk, teenagers chatting on the big white edges of the sidewalk and couples sitting on the benches. Lucas, Britt and Noor were sitting on an old Blanket in the middle of the lawn, some food and a bottle of wine in between them. Britt was looking at the people who were passing by, leaning on Noor who was sketching something, Lucas was reading in his book. </p><p>“I don’t understand it, there are so many hot guys out there and you could have them all. But. You are just sitting here and not caring about,” Britt looked at Noor and Lucas could feel the anger in Noor, shaking her head. “I just don’t want anyone, it’s not like we always need to be in a relationship, do we? I mean, look at Lucas, he’s sitting there, not caring about relationships at all” Britt sat up straight and stared at Lucas and Noor. “Wait, you both don’t want anyone and you are hanging together the whole time. Why didn’t you guys tell me you were dating? I don’t have a problem with it, really.” Lucas couldn’t do anything else than giving himself a facepalm with his book, rolling his eyes, while Noor started laughing. “Oh believe me, Lucas is so mysterious,  even if we would be dating, I probably wouldn’t even know it.”  “Hey, it’s not that I don’t tell you anything” </p><p>Britt’s gaze was jumping between Lucas and Noor “Guys, it’s not funny, it could have been, Lucas kinda reminds me of Robbe, so he could have been your type.” “Oh, maybe he is. That’s why he didn’t tell me who he likes. Lucas, I see what you are up to” Noor said laughing, coming closer to Lucas. “Yes for sure. That’s what I’ve been planning all along. Do you want to marry me?” Noor laughed, then gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Yes, Britt, don’t you think van Der Hejiden would be a great last name for me?”  “Well, if you guys stop making fun of me, I would tell you. Like seriously, it could have been possible” </p><p>“Sorry to say that, my beloved wife, but there’s someone else that I like way better,” Lucas bit his tongue. He was going to tell them, wasn’t he? “Who should be more fabulous than I’m, let me know the secret” “It’s…” Lucas took a breath. Was he ready? Now? With Britt here? He wanted them to know, it felt right too talk to someone, but. still, was he sure?</p><p>Noor was looking at him, with eyes full of expectation. “Do you want a drumroll or what?” “It’s..”  “JENS” “What?” Britt was waving towards two silhouettes on the other end of the lawn and he realised that his secret was still safe and that Jens and a little girl were walking through the park, the girl, who seemed to be his little sister Lucas had seen last Wednesday, was running towards the three teenagers. <br/>Britt stood up and walked toward Jens, hugging him and starting a conversation and jealousy digged a hole into Lucas stomach. Why was everyone else able to just casually talk to him? </p><p>“Lucaaaaaaas!” The little girl sat down in front of Noor and him. “And Noor, I didn’t know you knew each other” “Hey Lotte,” Noor hugged the little girl who looked at them and then back to Britt and her older brother. “I don’t like that girl, Jana is way nicer” “But you know you can’t say things like that, son’t you?” Noor was smiling “How do you know Lucas? He hasn’t been here for long.” “Well the same reason why I know you, he’s one of Jens’ friends and he was at our place last week, before Jana left. Isn’t it sad that she’s gone, she was always so nice to me.” Noor looked at Lucas “You were at Jens’ place?” “For sure he was, why is that weird? You were at our place too when Jens’ was celebrating things” Lotte looked excited, like she was telling a story she  really really wanted to tell someone, while Noor made an extremely interested impression. “Didn’t you tell her Lucas? He was at our place to give back a sweater and it was before Jana was leaving, so we baked something, because, you know, Jens and Jana always baked for me. And then Lucas came and gave me the sweater and Jana wanted him stay, but he didn’t, he had to go somewhere, didn’t you, Lucas?” Lotte was looking at the Dutch boy,  like she expected him to add important details to her story. “And well, after he left, Jens was upset or something and Jana made him happy again but I didn’t understand it, it’s that grown up drama, I don’t get older people,” she finished her story and Luca didn’t know what to do. </p><p> </p><p>“Noor, can you draw for me again?” Lotte grabbed Noor’s sketchbook and in the corner of his eye, Lucas saw Jens and Britt coming over. The little girl was crazy, talking like a waterfall, he thought while he could see Noor thinking, trying to connect the information she just had gotten with what she already knew about Lucas. “Lotte, I told you not to touch other people’s stuff. You need to ask before it, it’s rude if you don’t do it”. “But why?” “Well, imagine if there was a secret in Noor’s book and you would show it to everyone, that wouldn’t be cool, would it?” “Yeah you are right. Sorry Noor” <br/>Fascinated, Lucas followed the dialogue. He wouldn’t have expected Jens to be that good with kids, but the warm way he talked with his sister made Lucas’ heart melt and he once again cursed the whole situation for being this complicated. </p><p>In the mean time, Lotte was staring at the horizon, then her face lit upL. “I know it, Luca and you had a fight, didn’t you Jens? You know, you shouldn’t fight, mom always says that you have to talk about what happened and I like Lucas, you shouldn’t fight with him,” Lucas saw the confusion in the brown eyes of the taller boy and wanted to say something, to make the situation less weird, but Jens was faster. </p><p>“Speaking of mom, we should go now. I think these three were doing something important and if mom finds out you were longer at Sophie’s place, she is going to be mad with me. It’s already late, see, the sun is already sinking” Jens pointed at the sky and Lotte smiled. “Okay, but you have to talk with Lucas, okay? And I am too tired to walk, so we could stay her.” </p><p>As if it was the easiest thing in the world, Jens lifted up the little girl and after saying goodbye, the two were gone as suddenly as they appeared. Noor was staring at Lucas, who was staring into the emptiness, thinking about the things the little girl just had said. </p><p>Friday 10:51<br/>The hallways of the school were empty and Lucas’ steps were echoing as he was carrying the set of iPads towards his classroom. The school was trying to incorporate e-learning, so from time to time, their teachers would allow them to use tablets to create presentations or do researches. </p><p>Suddenly, someone grabbed Lucas wrist and he almost let the tablets fall down, trying not the scream of surprise. The hand was pulling him under the stairs, out of the hallway and Lucas didn’t know if he was happy or not to see that it was Jens. His heart started beating faster and he could see doubts in Jens eyes. What was this, didn’t he made it clear he didn’t want to talk about it? </p><p>“Lucas, I know that you don’t want to listen to me, I know you are upset, but can you listen to my little sister and just let me talk? Please,” Jens was looking at him, sad, his eyes similar to those of a puppy. “Can you not let it go?” “No, Lucas, I’m serious,I’ve been trying to explain it to you for a week now and I don’t know what you think, but I want you to know the truth. It’s not like we’re 12 year olds who can’t solve problems.” Lucas wanted to go, but he just couldn’t. He knew Jens was right and a tiny bit of him just hoped that he would hear something he wanted to hear. “If you let my wrist go, you have two minutes.”</p><p>Jens looked relieved. “i know what you think Lucas. I know you think Jana and I are dating and that, I don’t know, I just used you or something like that, but that’s not true. I like you, I really do. The second I saw you at lunch two weeks ago, I just wanted to go over and to get to know you, but I couldn’t. So I told Jana about it. We have been dating, I know, but we aren’t dating anymore. It’s just that she’s always going to be special for me, she was the first person I really loved and she was the only one that knew I was bi. So I told her that I liked you and she supported me, that’s why she knew everything. I really never wanted to hurt you, okay? I really want to get to know you and I know that I was an asshole and I probably deserve you ignoring me, but I don’t want you to think that I used you, because I am not like that and I really want to get to know you. That’s all I wanted to tell you”</p><p>Lucas didn’t know what to say. He wouldn’t have expected him to say that, but hearing that just relieved him. It was exactly what he wanted to hear, it meant that he had a chance and that all his worries were pointless. He was looking up to the ceiling, trying to hide his happiness and the fact that he was almost crying. He could feel Jens’ eyes at him and he could see how the boy was trying to read his reaction. </p><p>“Really?” “Lucas, I wouldn’t lie to you, I am dead serious, okay. You are worrying way too much” Lucas looked at him and his heart skipped another beat, trying to hold back the tears of happiness. “But, let me ask you one question Lucas. What is the thing with you and Noor?”<br/>“What?” “ I saw you guys yesterday and you are like so close, are you, I mean, dating?” “Me and Noor?” Jens nodded, like he was scared, not wanting to know the answer. “No, not at all. Noor and I are just really close, I think we are just kind of similar” </p><p>Jens needs to smile and Lucas heart warmed up. He was so pretty. His hair a bit messy, the green T-shirt and his eyes glancing. He could surely stare at the taller boy forever and he could feel the brown eyes on his face, looking at his lips. “I didn’t realise you were this pretty…” Jens whispered and Lucas couldn’t resist, he wanted to kiss him. Slowly, he reached for Jens neck, wanted to pull him closer to him. </p><p>With a loud bang, a binder fell down next to them and they flinched, creating space between them. “Fuck,” they heard someone screaming from above the stairs and a girl that was way younger than them appeared next to them, taking the binder and leaving again. <br/>Lucas shook his head and they needed to laugh. “We should get to class,” Jens said, laughing and Lucas nodded, way happier than he had been before. </p><p>Friday 20:28<br/>Lucas was looking out of a train window once again. It felt oddly familiar to him, sitting in a train and changing places. His backpack was laying on the seat next to him, a sketchbook and the. book he was currently ready were laying on the table. He had started sketching out the protagonist of his book, but a look at the time had revealed that he would be arriving in Utrecht in about five minutes, so he started putting the books back into the blue bag next to him. </p><p>His music was interrupted and the FaceTime icon popped up on his phone screen. </p><p>Jens Stoffels is calling you. </p><p>Lucas raised his eyebrows. Why was he calling him now? Lucas looked at his reflection in the window, trying to fix his hair that was messy once again, fixing his headphones. Would he look like a complete idiot? He took a deep breath and answered the call. </p><p>“Hey,  I already thought you weren’t going to pick up anymore.” Jens was looking adorable, he was slightly blushing and his hair was messy. “Hey” He smiled, Jens smiled and Lucas took a closer look at the image. Jens seemed to be sitting on a chair in his room, a guitar and his skateboard were leaning own one wall, a few clothing were tossed on the floor and next a few pictures, Lucas could see smaller posters. “Wait, is that a The 1975 poster behind you?” Jens took his phone and moved it towards the poster. “I thought you were the rap and Troye Sivan only kind of guy” “Well, I’m full of secrets. I love the 1975” “Well, there’s a thing we have in common”</p><p>Lucas smiled, already imagining him and the taller boy laying on a lawn and exchanging their favourite songs. “Where are you right now?” Jens’ question tore him out of his thoughts once again. “Oh, I’m on the train, I’m visiting my friends over the weekend”. Disappointment spread over Jens’ face “Oh well, than the reason I called you is gone. I was thinking about you and I wanted to ask you if you were up to hanging out this evening, there are plenty of places you need to see in Antwerp. I thought I could show them to you, but we can do it another time.” </p><p>Lucas looked at Jens and for a moment, he thought about just going back to Antwerp, even he knew he wouldn’t do it and he really wanted to see his friends. “That’s actually a cool idea, I’m totally up to do it.” “When are you going to be back?” “Sunday afternoon” </p><p>Lucas could see the train entering Utrecht station and he grabbed his backpack. Jens was noticing every move through the phone and Lucas felt blood rushing into his face. “Stop staring at me,” “I can’t, you in your natural habitat is pretty awesome.”  “Wow, now you talk about me like I am an animal. That’s rude.”  Jens laughed and Lucas needed to smile, then, he saw Isa on the platform. She was clearly looking  for him and he sighed, looking at the boy in his phone.</p><p>“My friend’s here, I should probably go, but I’ll text you” “Okay Luc, it was nice seeing you;” he couldn’t overhear the disappointment in Jens’ voice, but. then, the Belgian boy started smiling again. “Enjoy the time with your friends, okay?” “I’m sure I will” Lucas smiled as Jens left the call, happy that the boy had thought of him. </p><p>In the same moment, he heard a little scream as Isa saw him and she ran towards him, pulling him into a big hug. “Welcome home Luc” and Lucas smiled, taking every bit out of that hug, happy he was finally back with his friends and the thing with Jens seemed to work out as well. “I missed you Ies.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. four</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Trigger Warning since there's gay bashing and anxiety attacks mentioned in here.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Saturday 18:12<br/>
Lucas took a deep breath as he stepped out of the hospital, the clean and warm air was a welcoming contrast to the cold and forced atmosphere of the hospital. Seeing his mum had felt good, knowing the people in the psychiatry took good care of her made it easier for him, even if the visit had once again remembered him that he couldn’t stand hospitals of any kind. </p><p>He checked his phone, trying to open the lock of his bike while he was answering Jens’ most recent text. They had been texting constantly since last evening and on his way to visit his mom, Lucas had sent Jens pictures of a few of his favourite place in Utrecht. Now, they were discussing food, discussing which country had the better fries. </p><p>Listening to a playlist Jens had send him, Lucas drove to the flat share since he had planned to hang out with Jayden and Kes this evening. The door of the flat share was open, so he entered the small corridor, looking for his friends. The flat share was surprisingly empty, he only heard water boiling in the kitchen. </p><p>“Oh hi Lucas,” Ralph looked out of the kitchen. “Liv forced Jayden to get groceries and Liv is with the girls. I think you are stuck with me until the boys are back. Do you want coffee?” “Yeah why not?” Lucas entered the kitchen and jumped on the kitchen counter, crossing his legs as he opened his messenger to check if Jens had already texted him back. </p><p>“How are you? We didn’t talk much yesterday” Ralph was adding the water to the coffee and turned on music on his phone, which, surprisingly for Lucas, was Troye Sivan. “I’m pretty good, Antwerp isn’t as bad as I thought it would be” He got a notification, seeing that Jens had answered him. </p><p>Our fries are clearly the best, Belgium is the biggest fries producer in the world, there’s a reason for that.<br/>
¯\_(ツ)_/¯</p><p>Lucas smiled, thinking about what he could text back and Ralph’s head appeared on his shoulder, which made him flinch immediately. “Fuck don’t scare me like that” “Sorry, you were just completely consumed by your phone, who is Jens anyway?” Lucas nervously bit his tongue, trying to figure out wether he could trust Ralph. He wanted to tell someone and even if there was Noor, some support in the Netherlands wouldn’t be bad. </p><p>“Jens is a friends, probably one of the reasons why Antwerp isn’t that bad” “Ah yes. Is. He the one you have been texting with all of yesterday evening too?” “Okay, scratch that, we might be more than friends” “What?” “I think you heard what I said” Lucas was looking at Ralph, who smiled over his whole face. “Finally you told me, I thought you would never” “What? Now I am confused” “that you finally tell me that you like boys. Remember when you were on grindr last year? We were writing with each other but when I realised that it was you, I left it because I don’t know, it felt really wrong, but I’ve been waiting for you to come out since then” </p><p>Lucas could see himself blushing. “Fuck that’s embarrassing” “I already forgot about it, now tell me about that Jens guy” Lucas felt relieved, having told someone else about it and Ralph seemed to be supporting him more than he had expected. “He’s in my school, we have been in a cafe together” Ralph smiled and Lucas saw him searching for a Jens on instagram “And I don’t know, there’s not much to tell, I like him and he seems to like me back too and now we’re texting cause I’m here” “I always knew you had taste” Ralph said as he scrolled through Jens’ instagram “And now give me a hug Luc, I am freaking proud of you, I wouldn’t have expected you to tell me about it” </p><p>“Can you do me a favour?” The older boy nodded “Please don’t tell the other ones about it, okay? It’s just that I don’t want them to know about it now, I think they could react, you know, wrong and I just don’t want everything to collide again and I don’t want them to think about me wrong because I like boys.” Ralph nodded, looking at Lucas. “I get you, I was thinking that in the beginning too. And don’t worry, it’s your decision who you come out to, not mine” “Thanks”</p><p>The door to the flat share opened and Lucas could see Jayden and Kes entering the room, their arms loaded with bags of groceries. “Lucas, bro, help us, I swear Liv is thinking we are going to be locked in, that’s why she’s telling us to get that many groceries.” “How’s your mum man?” Lucas looked at his friends, taking a bag from Kes and grabbed a bottle of dutch beer out of it. “Wow, I missed this beer boys” he said and they started filling up the shelves as they shared stories and Lucas realised how much he had been missing the boys.</p><p>Saturday 23:44<br/>
“Oh come on, that guy is cheating,” Jayden and Kes were staring at the screen, fighting in some open world shooter. Lucas had died a while ago and was rolling a joint now, observing the things that were happening on the screen. “Dude, Jayden, get to the side or he’s going to kill you,” Lucas took out his phone, putting the weed down on the table. He had gotten a text but it was not as he had expected, from Jens, but a picture from Noor who seemed to be out with Britt. </p><p>Help me get that asshole away Luuuuc.<br/>
He looked at the picture for a second time and he could spot a guy hugging Britt. He sighed, trying to think about something he could say to cheer up Noor. “What’s up Luc, you’re on your phone all the time.” It’s just a friend in Antwerp,” “Wait, the one with the black hair? That girl is pure fire dude, you should get her laid” “Dude, Jayden, she’s just a friend and she belongs to someone else.” “I didn’t know that then. But you can’t tell me that you’ve been texting with her all of yesterday evening too, you are smiling every time you get a text from someone, is there someone in Antwerp we should know about?” “Oh no, not really” “Well you don’t need to tell us. THE HELL IS HE DOING” the boys’ characters on the screen were under attack. </p><p>Lucas laughed, seeing how his friends were leaving the area on the screen. Then, he saw another character out of his friends team and he needed to smile. Was that really? “Yo what is that dude doing again? AND WHAT KIND OF NAME IS JENS ANYWAYS?” He couldn’t believe it. Were his friends in the Netherlands really playing with his friends in Belgium without noticing it? “What kind of server is that?” “Some dutch server I guess, it’s the one we have been playing on all the time”</p><p>Lucas smiled, taking out his phone once again to text Jens. “Tomorrow’s mothers day, isn’t it?” Kes had died now too and lit the joint, leaning back on the couch and asking Lucas for last minute present ideas for his mom. </p><p>Sunday 22:00<br/>
The door to Lucas room opened. He had been back in Antwerp since five hours and had spend that time finishing his Math and dutch homework for tomorrow while he was listening to the songs that Jens had sent him for the train ride back. Now, Lucas was back and doodling stuff into his sketchbook and without paying a lot of attention to it, he had drawn places he had been at this weekend. The train with the window he had been staring out, the flat share and his room in Utrecht. There was only one sketch that didn’t fit the others. It was the café Jens and him had visited two weeks ago, the fluffy chair and the cozy interior, sketched with grey pencil. </p><p>Lucas needed to smile, the picture didn’t made a completely wrong impression next to the others on the page, it matched the happy memories he had made in the other places. The door to his room opened and his dad entered, looking stressed, wearing sweatpants and a dress shirt over it. “Lucas, you should sleep, you have classes tomorrow,” He was leaning towards the doorframe, yawning and throwing sceptical looks at the books that were building towers on Lucas’ desk. “It’s not that I am tired and if class starts at 8:30, I could stay awake until midnight and still get eight hours of sleep. What do you want? And why are you wearing sweatpants and a dress shirt?” “I have been in conference calls the whole day. That’s actually what I wanted to tell you. I will be in Minsk until next Sunday, we have to help our customers there. I am going to leave you money on the kitchen counter and you know how to reach Milan if you need anything, don’t you?” “Yeah, thanks for letting me know” “No problem son. If you are too lonely, you can invite friends over, as long as you don’t throw a huge party that destroys the whole apartment” “I’ll survive, but thank you” </p><p>His dad looked a bit surprised, not getting the usual cutting comment from Lucas as he left  the room, right when Lucas’ phone started vibrating. Lucas jump and reached for his phone. Jens was calling him, one again. Lucas felt the little butterflies in his stomach going crazy as he sat up straight, trying to make him look a bit less like he had been laying in his bed and drawing for the last two hours. </p><p>“Hey,” Jens looked flattering, as always, his cheeks red and his hair hanging down on his eyes. “Hey,” Lucas baths nails, trying to think about something they could talk about. “How are you? How long have you been back?” “My train arrived at like 16:45 and I’ve been doing homework the whole afternoon. So I guess I am pretty annoyed by my homework, what about you?” “Fuck homework. I still have to write an essay for my French class. But besides that, I’m pretty good. It’s mother’s day so I was more or less forced to stick with my family the. Whole day, especially since my older sister is home for like once,” Lucas smiled, imagining Jens with two sisters. “I could never imagine having siblings,” “Well then, lucky you. I have two sisters and Lotte is cute and all of that, but she can be extremely annoying and I barely even see Lies, my older sister, she graduated last year and every time she is home from university, I’m supposed to tell her about the lasted school gossip, which is so annoying, I feel like I know everyone’s business.” Lucas needed to smile, imagining a gossip girl Jens. </p><p>“I don’t think that you know everything about everyone,” Lucas was drawing Jens face while he was talking to him, trying to capture the moment on paper. “Oh yeah, there are definitely people I don’t know enough about, for example this new kid at our school, I just know that he likes art and sweet food, but that’s more or less it,” Lucas blushed. “I’d like to get to know that boy more. That’s why I actually wanted to pick him up at the train station today, but my family didn’t let me go.” </p><p>If he could have seen himself, he had probably realised how red his face was, but now, he was only feeling the riots of the butterflies in his stomach. “You wanted to pick me up at the station?” “Yeah, there are so many places that you need to see. And I hoped that you’d bring dutch weed, I want to know. If it’s really better than ours” “Wow I figured you out Jens. You talk to me because of the weed.” “For sure. That’s why I need us to meet too. I don’t want to spend time with you or something” Lucas laughed, “You’ll regret saying that, everyone wants to spent time with me.” “I don’t completely believe that, I guess you’ll have to convince me. When do you have time?” Lucas heart jumped higher as his mind already thought about Jens and him going out again. “I don’t know, I usually have less time for people who only want to spent time with me because of my drugs” “Okay, okay, the drugs are secondary, I really want to see you” Lucas could have giggled like a twelve year old, looking forward to the following week. </p><p>Monday 19:59<br/>
His dutch things were spread all over his bed as Lucas was trying to prepare a presentation about the differences between Dutch in the Netherlands and in Flanders.  His teacher had given him the little bonus assignment and he was almost done, writing down his sources on the last slide. He checked his phone, trying to find an article that he had read that matched the topic. </p><p>Are you home? Jens text popped up over the google results and Lucas raised an eyebrow. Probably, why do you want to know that?  He closed his laptop and his dutch books and looked at his phone, waiting for an answer, which came immediately. Get your jacket and skateboard and come to the front door. </p><p>How do I know you don’t want to kidnap, rob and then murder me? Lucas stood up and grabbed his beloved jeans jacket that was hanging over his chair. Trust me on this :). I’ll show you Antwerp before I kill you, so it would be worth it. On the way out, Lucas grabbed his board and he ran down the stairs, making his heart beat even faster than it had been beating since he got the first message from Jens. What was he planning?</p><p>The air outside was colder than Lucas had expected and he was happy that he took his jacket with him this time, even if the chance that he could get one of Jens’ hoodies again isn’t a bad one. The boy with the dark hair was leaning on the door to the apartment complex and as he saw Lucas, his face lit up. Jens was wearing his red hoodie and a yellow beanie, something that Lucas wouldn’t have expected to look good on him, but the boy seemed like he could even wear the old curtains of Lucas’ grandma and still look stunning in them. </p><p>“Hey,” Jens voice was soft and Lucas could see him smiling. “Hey,” he said, “So why do you want to show me Antwerp before you murder me?” “I don’t know, probably because I am a nice guy, trying to prove that I don’t only like you for your weed and because I want to get that extra credit from the teachers for being nice to the new kid,” Lucas laughed and couldn’t help himself but stare at Jens. It was like he would ever get tired of watching Jens’ face, the way his mouth moved as he was speaking and the little sparks in his eyes as he was smiling. </p><p>“So, what are we doing for you extra points? Noor already took me tourist-watching, so you can’t do that,” Jens smiled., “Believe me, I’ve something way better planned and I brought food.” Jens held up a brown back and Lucas recognised the logo of the café they had been at two weeks ago. “Last time, we didn’t get to finish,  so I thought we could make up for that now” “So you planned a picnic?” “No, you’re not getting it. Just trust me okay?” “But how do I know that you won’t murder me?” “If I wanted to murder you, I would have done it by now, believe me. Now come on, I don’t want to stand here all evening.”</p><p>Jens kicked his board down on the floor and rapidly started to move. Lucas was surprised, but he started following the taller boy who was smiling the whole time. Soon, they had left the part of the city that Lucas knew and Jens started telling him stories about the places they were driving by, so Lucas got to know the places where Jens and Robbe had been playing as small children, the big area the yearly free-fest took place, Jens’ favourite bar and places the gang was hanging out a lot. Lucas felt like he was part of all of this, imagining all the things Jens was telling him, letting Lucas closer into his live and giving him a part of his home. </p><p>They were skating through various streets of Antwerp, talking and Jens almost ran over a group of younger girls since he was constantly staring over his shoulder to check if Lucas was still following him. The girls were complaining loudly, but Jens talked to them and gave them a quick smile and they became nice, melting away for Jens just the way Lucas did. With laughters, they left the place of the almost accident and Jens smiled at Lucas. “There’s a bridge about half a  kilometre from here. You just need to go straight down the road, wanna make a race?” “Are you challenging me? Because you’ll loose” “We will see,” Jens got down from his board, coming closer to Lucas and Lucas could feel his heart beating in his chest like the wings of a hummingbird. What was Jens doing here? Their face were close, Lucas could already hear Jens’ silent breaths. The Belgian boy smiled. “You won’t win.”</p><p>He took a step back and was on his board, quickly moving forward and away from Lucas who stood there, feeling like someone had emptied a huge bucket of ice cold water over his head as he jumped on his board, chasing Jens down the street. The bridge came closer and closer and the distance  between both of them was shrinking, but Jens clearly won the race, sitting down on the bridge and waiting for Lucas to arrive. </p><p>“You cheated,” he was completely out of breaths and he could also see the effort in Jens’ face, his cheeks red and his hair completely messy from the wind. Jens laid back, leaning on the barrier of the bridge. “I didn’t cheat, I told you you wouldn’t win and I was right,” heated on the ground next to him and just now, Lucas saw the beautiful skyline he could see through the stylistic holes in the white steel. The sun had just started sinking over Antwerp and he could spot a few places they had been at today as he sat down next to Jens. A few people were passing by, but overall, they were the only people sitting here, watching the sun sinking and sharing the food Jens had brought. </p><p>Lucas rested his spine on Jens’ side. “And, was this worth getting murdered?” “I’m not completely convinced” Lucas felt like he was drowning in the warm brown of Jens. All of this just felt warm and a little bonfire in his chest was growing, making him feel like he had found his place. Jens was staring down the water under them. “If this bridge would just crack and fall apart, we would have to swim. Then it probably wouldn’t be necessary for me to murder you.” “I bet I would be more likely to survive, I was in a swim team until middle school,” “You were? I was at the boy scouts, I’s probably be able to rescue myself,” they were looking at each other and Lucas felt the strikes of the sinking sun in his face, the warm light made Jens look like a piece of art, with little golden dots in his face. “I bet you wouldn’t survive the fall down there Lus, and I would need to rescue you, dragging. You out of the water because you couldn’t hold your breath long enough and swallowed water,” “I didn’t knew you were part of the Baywatch,” “I’m full of surprises” “I still bet I can hold my breath longer than you,” “Okay, I’ll bet against it. What do I get when I win?” “We will see.” Lucas stared into Jens’ eyes and his heart went crazy as an idea how he could definitely win this bet set in his head. </p><p>Jens smiled. “Okay then, one, two, three,” Lucas filled his lungs with air and almost immediately lost as he saw Jens’ face, his cheeks big, filled with air. He looked like a dork and Lucas could feel Jens’ strong gaze on him as he slowly moved closer to  him. Should he? His eyes wandered down to his lips and without further thinking, Lucas leaned over to Jens, kissing him with a smile in his face. He could hear Jens exhaling and smiled. “I won,” he whispered. “You clearly cheated, but I won’t complain,” Jens voice was more relaxed than during the whole evening and Lucas could feel Jens’ hand on his head, softly pulling him back into a kiss and this time, all of the. Feelings in. Lucas’ stomach exploded as he felt Jens’ lips one his own. They were different from the ones of the girls he had kissed before, so beautifully different. Lucas wrapped his arm around Jens neck and the taller boy pulled him closer, closing up the space between them. “You don’t know how long I have waited for this,” Jens mumbled into the kiss and Lucas could just nod, kissing the taller boy, wrapped in his arms as the were sitting on their skateboards on a bridge, the warming sunset in their faces. Finally, he thought, as he took a deep breath, letting Jens’ smell of shampoo and bread warming him from the inside. </p><p>Wednesday 08:23<br/>
The schoolyard wasn’t full yet. A few students were sitting in little groups, helping each other with homework or sipping on a cup of To Go coffee. Lucas sat down on one of the table, throwing the key to his bike into his backpack. In the corner of his eye, he saw four people walking towards him. “Hey Lucas, what’s up dude?” The boys going him on the table. “Not much, kinda don’t want to go to physics,” “Oh fuck physics,” Moyo was looking at Lucas like he had opened the box of Pandora. “I didn’t do the assignment. Can I copy it from you?” “Oh come on, it was not even that much,” “Easy to say. I bet you did half of it in the Netherlands before we even started,” Lucas lifted his arms up to his side, clearly knowing that he had the worksheet filled out in his backpack. “Who knows.”</p><p>The boys started talking about some party they were planning to join on Friday and even if Lucas tried to pay attention to Moyo’s explanation about how he knew the girl who was throwing the party and how he was planning to get her laid, he got distracted by Jens. Or more by the way Jens was staring at him. Lucas felt himself already slightly blushing. “But bro, even if you know her because she is friends with her, that doesn’t mean you are going to get her laid. Even if you could need it,” Robbe was smiling at his phone while he said that. “Well you have fucking Sander and we know that your relationship is working well, but shouldn’t you and Aaron support the half of your friend group that has no-one?” “Speaking of Sander, he’s joining us for skating tomorrow, do you want to come too?” “Yeah sure.”</p><p>Stop staring Luc.<br/>
His attention got consumed by a text from Jens, who started smiling as Lucas checked his phone. </p><p> </p><p>It’s not like you are not staring. </p><p>I can’t help it Luc, you are the only thing on the school yard that I can look at.<br/>
Lucas felt himself blushing, he was probably as red as a tomato. He looked at Jens and shook his head, forming a silent “Stop” with his lips. “And you Luc, is there a girl waiting for you in. The Netherlands?” Aaron and Moyo were looking at him. “Or a boy,” Robbe added and Jens’ face lit. “I like to keep my secrets, but no, not in the Netherlands,” Jens smiled at him and Lucas craved to tell them, but he was holding it back, knowing that he had promised himself to tell Noor first and not knowing what Jens thought about all of this. </p><p>Wednesday 21:12<br/>
Lucas was once again observing the sinking sun, sitting next to his window and sipping on. A glass of tea. He had sketched out Jens’ face and was now putting him in a shirt that looked very familiar to the dusty curtains that had been hanging in his grandma’s house. Since he had had that thought on Monday, everything in him was screaming to draw Jens like this and now. That he could see Jens wearing his grandma’s curtains, he one again realised why he was so thrown away by the long-legged boy. </p><p>His phone ringing interrupted the silence of the moment, drowning the sound of his pencil on the paper. Jayden was face-timing him and Lucas quickly closed his sketchbook, throwing it towards the books on his desk. </p><p>“What up bro?”, Lucas saw Jayden and Kes and the background seemed to be the skate hall they used to hang out at. In the background, he could see the other guys out of their boy squad, doing tricks on the ramps and laughing. Seeing this made him happy, it was almost like. He had never left. “Not much, I’ve been literally sitting in my room the whole evening,” “Not much to do in Belgium?” “Well, most of them are working today, but I’m going skating tomorrow and there’s a party on friday, I don’t think I’ll get bored that fast.” “So you are replacing us with Belgians then? Going skating and partying was our thing,” Lucas knew that Kes was joking, but that joke made him once again feel bad, left out. For sure, he was missing his friends, but just because they weren’t here, it didn’t mean he would just replaced them. Was Kes thinking that of him? </p><p> </p><p>“I wouldn’t replace you, but probably Jayden,” “What?!” Kes laughed. “Lord that’s good, I mean, we are technically married Luc, you shouldn’t leave me alone,” “If we look at that like this, I’d prefer Jayden. I’m already married to my friend her Kes,” “Wow what? Lucas you are not telling anything, There are people that are dumb enough to  be friends with you,” hearing the old jokes they already used to make of each other when they first met made Lucas happy. </p><p>“I’m looking at the two dumbest persons on this planet then,” “Well. Fair enough. But luck seriously, how is it going?” “Pretty good, my dad is not home this week and I’ve found. People. To hang out with, besides the girls we already talked about and…” </p><p>“Man Lucas, I haven’t seen you in a while,” another boy appeared in the background and Lucas could hardly recognise him, he had graduated a few years ago and was hanging bout at the skate hall too, but Lucas had a hard time remembering his name or how. Both of them were connected. Someone was shouting something and Mr. Unknown disappeared. “Who was that?” Kes was looking at Lucas, but instead, Jayden gave an answer. “He’s graduated like three years ago, but I don’t know why he knows Lucas. That guy is an idiot, dangerous and aggressive. I heard that he broke the ribs of another guy because he was trying to hit on him and he has like a fully filled police report and all that stuff,” Jayden’s explanation gave Lucas chills and he finally remembered why he knew the guy. “But anyways, tell us more about Antwerp Luc, are all of the girls there as ht as that Noor?” </p><p>Thursday 18:34<br/>
The skatepark was pretty filled, groups of teenagers were sitting on top of the ramps or skating, trying  not to hit each other and it took Lucas a second to spot the boys, while Jens saw him immediately and waved him over. The boys were sitting on the floor, a few cans of beer between them. “Hey mate,” Lucas gave the boys the handshake he had learned in the last weeks, then he let himself fall down next between Sander and Jens. </p><p>“Wow that’s disgusting, how can this be allowed to be actually called beer?” less serious, Lucas put down his can, “You guys should definitely come to the Netherlands with me, the beer there is way better.” “I told you guys he would say something like that,” Jens was smiling and grabbed Lucas’ beer. “But if you aren’t gonna drink it, there’s more for us so I won’t complain.” </p><p>Lucas shook his head and grabbed the can, clearly knowing that Jens’ and his fingers would touch and for a short moment, he felt like it was obvious now, since they were basically holding hands around a can of beer, so he rapidly pulled his hand back, almost spilling the beer all over himself. “Bad taste is not a reason to not drink it though.” Jens was looking at him and Lucas once again noticed something in the taller boy’s brain working, but he couldn’t think more about it since Moyo had jumped up and looked at Robbe and Sander who had started kissing each other,  probably forgetting that they weren’t on a date but with their friends. </p><p>“Dudes, you know I love both of you but we are her for skating, not for making out and making your bros feel lonely,” “Wait, if we are here for skating, why am I here then?” Sander looked between the boys, “We all know that I can’t skate and I will probably just kill Lucas again if I am trying to,” Lucas needed to smile and Aaron made a confused face, looking between them. </p><p>“Why would you want to kill Lucas though? We like him and we haven’t tried the dutch weed yet,” “That’s true, I think we could kill him after we smoked away all of his weed,” Jens was looking at Lucas. “Wow, I didn’t know all of you were so interested in my weed, I probably should look for other friends then,” “No, you shouldn’t. We’re the best people in whole Antwerp, especially if Sander is not trying to kill you and sharing his attention not exclusively with Robbe, so come on, let’s go skating,” Jens had jumped up too and walked over to the ramps, followed by Aaron and Lucas. While the other boys were skating on the ramps and exchanging tricks, Lucas could spot Robbe still trying to teach Sander how to skate a bit besides the  boy squad. </p><p>Friday 03:33<br/>
Lucas woke up, feeling his heart pounding up his chest and his whole body shivering. Taking breaths was hard, it seemed like the air was burning him from the inside and his whole body was tensing up. The darkness of his room swallowed every bit of light and Lucas was confused as he realised that he wasn’t in his small room in Utrecht, that the walls were empty and the small window over his bed wasn’t there. </p><p>Where was he? Why was he panicking? What had happened? Lucas tried to take longer breaths, the fire in his lungs brought tears up in his eyes and every breath was loud in his head, louder than Lucas could have handled. “Stop crying you idiot,” he whispered to himself, biting his tongue. He wasn’t allowed to cry. Crying was weak. </p><p>He moved, looking for a point he could hold on to. The sheets under him were loud, everything was loud and the darkness made him feel sick. What was this? He tried to move but the agony in his body made him numb, unable to move. Even more panic rose up in him. He couldn’t move. What if? </p><p>Lucas tried to remember something, digging his fingers into his palms. Pain cut through his body and the thing to focus on made him calmer. He was breathing hardly, but the pain started to ease away. His sight started to clear and Lucas could recognise shadows of furniture. A desk. Books. An open cupboard. His skateboard. </p><p>His mind started clearing up, his thoughts slowly started to organise. His lungs were still burning, his heart was beating in his whole body. Thinking was exhausting, taking every last bit of energy out of his body, but he could think again. </p><p>With shaky hands, he grabbed his blanket. He wasn’t in his room, but in Belgium. In his dad’s apartment. Belgium. His mum. The stapler. Noor. Kes. Jens. </p><p>His mind was working now and even if it was running wild, it was better than not being able to think at all. It was better than only feeling fear eating him from the inside. </p><p>He was still dizzy, feeling his stomach cramping up and his beating fast and he flinched as biting pain hit him. Lucas felt fear, he wanted to run away, scream, cry. The memory that flashed up in his head was painful, something he had almost forgotten about. </p><p>He couldn’t stop his tears from running down now and he was howling out of pain. Guilt. Disgust. Anger. Fear. He couldn’t describe what he was feeling, it felt like he was drowning in it. </p><p>He blindly grabbed for his phone, his hands were so forceless, he almost dropped it as he was pressing himself into the bed, trying to sit up. </p><p>He had one new message.<br/>
It was good seeing you today Luc. </p><p>He had wrote him. He was there. Lucas calmed himself down. It had just been a stupid nightmare, hadn’t it? Nothing to worry about, just idiotic things that were laying in the past. Memories. They were okay. </p><p>He knew that his lies wouldn’t help him much, but his pulse was slowly calming down. He. Turned on  the lamp on the side of his bed, throwing his teary face into his pillows, knowing he wouldn’t get any more sleep tonight. </p><p> </p><p>Friday 21:53<br/>
The place the party took place in was huge and according to Noor, it had been the storage hall of some old company that artist now used to display their art in and on some days of the month, someone unknown set up parties that you could only access with a password. They had met in front of the building and were now running up the stairs, following Moyo who seemed to know this place better than anything in the entire world. “How can he be so motivated?” Lucas’ legs were burning, trying to keep up with the other ones without gasping for air, trying not to show how exhausted he was. </p><p>His whole admiration went to Noor as he was was passing by him, wearing heels but not even making the impression that she was struggling with the stairs. With relief, he saw that they had reached the top of of the building and a big open room with high walls opened up. Lucas could see big speakers on the walls and the walls were partly sprayed. People were dancing in the middle of the room, there was a bar on the side of the room and he spotted a roof terrace on the other end of the room. “How do you guys know this stuff?” </p><p>Lucas was stunned, trying to process all of the new impressions as a group of other teenagers, probably a bit older than them was joining them. “They are the reason we are here,” Robbe was looking at him as a well known white had appeared between the group and hugged pulled Robbe into a kiss. “It’s basically a hangout spot for all the art students,” Noor pointed at the wall and Lucas took a closer look at the art work, recognising Sander’s style in a few of them. </p><p>“This is sick, so it’s basically a big studio and a gallery and a club,” “We had a dance performance here too, the company doesn’t really care about the building but it’s still in pretty good shape,” Lucas was fascinated by the artwork and he couldn’t stop staring at the wall, looking at the mixture out of different styles and motives. </p><p>“Pretty impressive huh?” Sander was standing next to him, Robbe’s arms wrapped around his shoulders like he was a baby chimpanzee. “This one is the first thing I’ve ever sprayed,” Sander pointed at a red and blue flash that was surrounded by quotes that look like they were written with black sharpie. “It’s awesome baby,” Robbe kissed Sander, pulling him away from the group and they both disappeared in the mass of dancing people. </p><p>Lucas looked around and he saw Noor sitting on an old shelf, talking to another group of girls. “are you coming or do you want to stare at art the whole evening?” Moyo had appeared behind him and pointed towards the exit to the roof terrace. Lucas followed them and as they reached the outside of the building. The overview of Antwerp stunned him as him and the boys were sitting down on one of the stone blocks on the terrace. Jens made himself fall down next to Lucas and Moyo lit the joint Lucas had gave him earlier the evening. “Holy Fock this shit is actuallygood,” “Told you so” </p><p>He was standing a bit on the side of everything, listening to the beat of the music as someone grabbed his hand, pulling him out of the big hall. “What are you doing?” Lucas looked at Jens. “ I just didn’t get to see you alone and you have been looking pretty distracted the whole evening, not getting my signs so I thought I’d pull you away,” Jens smiled at him. Lucas looked down to the floor, feeling guilty for being distracted by his thoughts the whole evening. Something in this situation felt off but he couldn’t think about it anymore. Jens did seem to notice that something was going on in Lucas’ head. </p><p>“What’s wrong?” Lucas just shook his head. “Nothing, it’s just crazy what has been happening in the last weeks,” Lucas threw a nervous gaze around them, seeing that they were the only ones in the hallway. “Hey, there are barely people who know how to get here okay. We’re alone, if that’s what’s…” Jens didn’t got to finish the sentence since he got grabbed on his collar as Lucas was pulling him closer to him. Jens seemed to be a bit surprised by that move but he didn’t seem to bother about it as he leaned into a kiss, “Okay then”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. five</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: homophobia and panic attacks</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Saturday 13:09<br/>Lucas was staring at Jens, both of them sitting on the window-sill his room, their ankles touching each other. A sketchbook was laying on Lucas thighs and the only noice in the room were the light strokes of his pencil on the paper. <br/>Jens shifted his gaze from the window to him and bowed his head towards the dutch boy, looking at the portrait of him on Lucas’ lap, slightly starting to smile. “Wow, I knew you were artsy but now I’m proud I got myself an art boyfriend.” His grip around the pencil tensed up and his next line was hard, not fitting the soft look he had given Jens, but he ignored it, trying not to show how much this little sentence was churning him up on the inside. </p><p>“I mean, that’s what we are, aren’t we?” Jens looked at him and Lucas shrugged his shoulders. “I guess,” he was insecure, not knowing wether this was what he wanted. For sure, Jens was giving him butterflies in his stomach and making his heart go crazy and Lucas could see himself and Jens being happy, but there was something off, shifting the balance Lucas wanted so badly. He felt guilty for being unsure, for feeling insecure and he was afraid, almost expecting everything to crash into pieces once again. </p><p>“Luc, did I say something wrong?” He felt Jens’ hand on his knee and the taller boy’s face was probably an inch away from his own, his eyes calm and Lucas could hear Jens’ slow and steady breaths. Lucas tried to focus on what was there, trying to build up a wall in his mind to keep the anxious and bad thoughts away out of this moment, still feeling guilty for ruining the atmosphere of the moment, trying to think of something to say. </p><p>“It’s just,” he swallowed, already feeling bad for lying to Jens and himself “I don’t know if I want the other ones to know. I’m out to literally one person and I just can’t imagine the others thinking different about me or telling them…” “That’s okay” Jens’ voice was full of affection “You know, not everyone can be a hundred percent brave all of the time. I never came out to the others because I don’t think it matters that much and if you need time, we can do that.” Lucas felt bad. Yes, he was insecure about coming out, but that wasn’t the whole truth and seeing Jens being so understanding, there for him and giving him time was making him feel even more guilty and ashamed. </p><p>He nodded and Jens pulled him into a hug, pressing Lucas close to him. “I like you Lucas and if you aren’t comfortable with it, that’s okay. I can imagine that things are going a bit fast, especially since you are not home here.” “I guess it’s becoming my home though. There’s someone that is making me feel like it,” “You will need to introduce me to your dad then, I can imagine the efforts he is putting in making you feel like you belong here,” “You are stupid Jens, I’m talking about you,” Lucas said and shifted his weight forward, closing up the space between them. </p><p>His sketchbook dropped to the floor as Jens was pulling him closer, which made Lucas smile. He hurried his hands in the dark hair of the boy, slightly pushing him against the window. Jens’ hand on his back made him feel better, giving him a bit of stability. Maybe, it would work out like this, not thinking about it could make things better. Lucas relaxed a bit, feeling the connection to Jens letting him escape from his thoughts for a minute.  </p><p>Sunday 22:58<br/>Lucas threw his head in the pillow, trying to sleep. It was still early in the evening, but he had already kind of guessed that he would have troubles falling asleep and well yes, he had been right. He was staring at the the empty, white ceiling, hearing his clear breath and every single movement he did, the covers rustling over him. </p><p>Lucas stood up, walking over to the window sill, sitting down and pulling his knees close to him. The sky of Antwerp was lit up by the lights and Lucas was staring at his reflection in the window, unlocking his phone with one hand. He started scrolling through his instagram, already regretting it, knowing that his phone would keep him awake even longer. He stopped scrolling as he saw a post from Sander. </p><p>Lucas tapped on the hashtag under it. What was a Idahot? His screen was suddenly filled with rainbows and he tapped on the first post that looked like it could give him serious information about the topic.</p><p>Today it's International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia. Unfortunately, we still have to deal with that in the Netherlands and there are people who believe that we should not be ourselves and that we should not openly show who we love. <br/>Lucas swallowed, the sentence hit him differently and he already thought about shutting down his phone. He was probably the best example for not showing who he was and the fact that the post talked about it and was from a dutch side made him feel like the whole universe wanted to push him out of  the closet, telling him to be true to himself and he felt guilty for not being that open about him. </p><p>He continued scrolling through the hashtag and found another dutch post Seven local teens telling their experiences with homophobia. from a magazine in Amsterdam and even though Lucas knew he didn’t want to read it, he couldn’t help himself and started reading the article. The stories made him wanna throw up, reading about a girl that had been thrown out of her house after she came out as trans, a boy that had been sent to illegal conversion therapy and bullying. Lucas couldn’t believe that all of this was happening in the country he grew up in, his home. Lucas reached the last story and the second he saw the portrait over the post, everything in him was pulling itself together and he started shaking. </p><p>Lucas would have lied if he said he didn’t recognised the boy, he clearly did. Lucas could feel his breath going faster, panic rising up in him. All of it was coming back at him now. Lucas didn’t even know how, he had completely pushed that evening back and he hadn’t though about it in months, it had worked out well. Why was all of it coming back to him now? </p><p>Lucas could hear his blood rushing, throwing his phone to the other corner of the room. His phone landed on the floor with a loud noise, he flinched and he felt his heart rate getting faster, panic rising in him. Why did he have to read that article? Why was all of it coming back to him? Why now, when things were going good with Jens and- </p><p>Jens. Was he okay? Worries were rising up in him, making his throat tight. What if the same things were repeating again? Lucas could feel a river of tears rushing through his face, trying to hold them back. He pressed his spine into the wall, tensing up in his whole body, trying to take controlled breaths, trying to calm down. </p><p>His lungs were burning once again as he took a gasp for air. It was his fault that all of it had happened. He had destroyed it, forgetting about it. Lucas could clearly see the moments once again, feeling disgusted by his past self, feeling disgusted by the way he had acted after all of it. And feeling scared that all of it could repeat. What if he was destroying all of it again, like it had happened before? </p><p>His breaths were getting shorter and the panic was slowly evolving into pain. What was happening? He crunched up, contracting all of his muscles, trying to force his breath to get regular, but he couldn’t control it as the the tears ran down his face and he put his palms over his face, breathing into his hands and trying to calm down, but all of it didn’t help. </p><p>Monday 23:14<br/>Lucas and Jens were sitting on the couch in the living room, empty plates in front of them, Lucas resting his head on Jens’ upper legs. The taller boy was drawing little circles on Lucas scalp, the regular movement of his fingers making Lucas calm down. Some movie was playing on the TV, two empty plates were standing on the coffee table and empty glasses were standing next to the couch. Both of them weren’t really attention the movie, Lucas because the comfort of the situation was making him calm down for a bit and he was about to fall asleep, easier and faster. than in in the last days and Jens because he couldn’t take hiss eyes away from Luc who was laying in his lap, looking so peaceful and vulnerable right now. </p><p>Lucas could feel himself drifting away, feeling protected and the warmth Jens making him fall asleep even faster. “This is good,” Lucas mumbled to himself, sleepy and through a wall of comfort, thick as cotton round him. Jens nodded and wrapped his second arm around Lucas’ chest, pulling him closer towards him. Lucas could hear Jens’ steady heartbeat close to his head and having Jens close to him, knowing that the things were fine for just a second. </p><p>“Luc?” “Huh?” Lucas rose up his head, looking at his boyfriend through tired eyes. “Noor seems to be texting you like crazy, you probably got twenty messages from her in the last minute. I really didn’t want to wake you up, but I think it’s important,” “It’s fine,” Lucas yawned into his hand and unlocked his phone, seeing 42 texts from Noor. “Fuck,” Lucas already had an idea what all of this was about, without even reading the texts. “What?” Jens was looking over his shoulder and two new texts from Noor arrived. </p><p>Are you at home?<br/>Can I please come over I just can’t stay at my family tonight?</p><p>Jens looked at him, questioning, riding an eyebrow. “i’ll explain it later, okay? Or just let Noor explain it, I think she needs to just get out for a bit.” Jens was looking at him, a bit concerned. “Luc, should I go? I mean, if Noor is coming and  you don’t want her to know, I can totally leave?” Lucas just shook his head. “It’s okay,” “Are you sure?” Lucas wanted to answer but he got interrupted by the bell. “Now it’s too late anyways, I’m okay with it,” Lucas gave Jens a quick kiss on the cheek as he got up to get the door. </p><p>The image that appeared made this heart already break. Noor was standing in front of the door, only wearing a t-shirt and pants, without a jacket or a purse. Her mascara was smudged from tears running down her face and she was shaking, her chest rising and falling fast. “I told her,” her voice was shaky, and Lucas pulled her into a hug. “I told her that that asshole is just going to break her heart again, letting her fall and she’s going to cry about it while there are people that like  in the right way and would be there for her and not letting her fall like the assholes do and she screamed at me, asking me how I would know since I am the one who has been single for the longer time and I said that that’s because of her and she just completely freaked out and I don’t know what happened, I just ran away.”</p><p>Lucas pulled Noor closer, brushing over her back and pulling her into the apartment. “It’ll be okay,” Noor was collapsing into his arms, bursting into even more tears now. “You should get some sleep, you look like you are dying and tomorrow everything will look different,” “You think?” ”Yes, come on, you can sleep in my room,” Lucas brought Noor into his room, trying to make iher feel comfortable, helping her. </p><p>Lucas came out of his room, seeing that Jens had cleaned up the living room and was now sitting on the kitchen counter. “I’m sorry,” Lucas pushed himself next to the taller boy. “Our date should have turned out different,” Jens hugged Lucas, burying his head in Lucas sweater. “Dumbass, seeing you taking care of your friend is the cutest thing I’ve seen in a while,” he mumbled. “And now come on, we need to finish that movie,” Jens pulled him back onto the couch and Lucas rolled himself up next to the taller boy, falling asleep extremely fast, wrapped in the good feeling of being safe for a moment. </p><p>Tuesday 06:45<br/>Lucas’ alarm went off and he was confused that he wasn’t laying in his bed, but on the couch in the living room, wrapped in a thin blanket, rolled up on the couch, still wearing his clothes from yesterday and snuggling his head into a piece of red fabric. He was tired and could have gone back to sleep right in that moment, but the last night had given. It was the first time since Friday that he had slept without waking up full of panic and then not being able to sleep again, just knowing that Jens was with him had calmed him down enormously. He turned around, trying to grab for the taller boy who he expected to lay next to him, but the only thing he grabbed for was air, the couch was empty. He was alone. </p><p>Lucas sat up straight, looking through the room. Where was Jens? Why did he leave his hoodie? The whole apartment seemed empty, except for Noor’s steady breaths out of his own room. Lucas grabbed his neck, it was stiff from sleeping on the couch. There was no sign of Jens and Lucas felt like throwing up already, scared, feeling like he had screwed up again. He wanted to take his phone, texting Jens to ask him if he was okay, as a piece of paper feel out of the hoodie. </p><p>Hey Luc &lt;3, I had to get home and I didn’t want to wake you up since you had fallen asleep and you looked like you really needed it, I couldn’t bring it over my heart to wake you up, you wouldn’t leave my hoodie so I left it here. I hope you slept well and hug Noor from me, I can’t wait to see you at school -J</p><p>Relief overcame him. It had been stupid of him, forgetting that Jens had told him. He. Needed. To get home before one in the morning so his parents wouldn’t worry. He had told. him. Why was Lucas stressing about it so much? He shook his head, in disbelief of how worried he was. This wasn’t Utrecht, this was different. Lucas took the hoodie and felt the soft fabric under his hands, putting it on and taking deep breath. It felt like Jens was still here for a second and he needed to smile. “Look, it’s all fine,” he said to himself, convincing. This was different.</p><p>He sneaked into his room, trying not to wake up Noor. She was laying in his bed, looking exhausted but way better than yesterday evening, drowning in the fabric of some old t-shirt Lucas had given her yesterday. He grabbed a few clothes and his phone charger and silently closed the door behind him. </p><p>He was standing in the kitchen, boiling water for some coffee as Noor came into the room, looking extremely sleepy. “How are you?” Noor sat down on top the kitchen counter, looking at him out of red, swollen eyes. “I think I cried myself to sleep, but it’s better now,” She yawned into her hand. “I’ll need to get home to get my books,” “Don’t stress about it, we have like one hour before we need to get to school,” </p><p>“Thank you Lucas, I just couldn’t go home yesterday” “It’s okay, you don’t need to talk about it,” Lucas wrapped his friend into a hug. “Thank you,” Noor whispered, “I don’t deserve a friend like you,” “Shut up Noor, you deserve the world.” </p><p>Wednesday 19:50<br/>Lucas was sitting on the big stone blocks that bordered the park in front of the apartment complex. He heard birds singing and people talking around him and Lucas could focus on what he was feeling fo just a brief moment. The fresh air made him think clearer and the past weeks went trough his head. </p><p>The nightmares had started making him unsure about things again. Not getting enough sleep was messing with his mind. When he had come to Belgium, he had been unsure about all of his life. He had convinced himself that his life wasn’t going to be good here and now, one month later, his life here was nearly perfect, he had a boyfriend, friends that he wanted that he was feeling more or less secure with and he didn’t really bother spending time here anymore, no, this place already felt like home to him. </p><p>But now, the whole situation had shifted again and it genuinely scared him. His nightmares had gotten worse and worse and he had spend the last night laying awake again, staring at his ceiling and trying to suppress the memories that seemed to be coming back to him as soon as he had nothing specific to think about. Not getting sleep made his life harder than he had expected, he was struggling to concentrate in class, not bring able to catch one clear thought and making it hard for him to decide things and making him unhappy about everything. </p><p>The fresh air made his mind clearer and helped him reflecting on all of it, showing that there was one thing that he knew for sure. He wanted to be with Jens. He made him calm down, he made him feel like home. Jens was an anchor for him, which made Lucas terrified. He couldn’t loose Jens, he just couldn’t wrap his mind around the idea of disappointing Jens someday, about fucking all of it up and loosing every connection to his life here. </p><p>A group of teenagers passed by, laughing and having conversation. The boys were carrying gym bags and holding glass bottles in his hands and a wave of the smell of beer carried over to him, giving him goosebumps. Their loud words woke something in Lucas, making him feel uncomfortable. “Sorry man,” one of the guys bumped in his side and Lucas instantly grew back, trying to avoid the contact with the stranger as his heart starting beating faster and faster. </p><p>The big group of boys was scaring him, suddenly bringing back all of it once again as they went on, disappearing out of his eyes. He could hear the beat of his heart clearly, blood rushing in his ears, not knowing what to do to stop it. </p><p>An imagine appeared in his mind, an empty street, lit by very few lights. He knew the street, for gods sake, he knew this street, he knew what had happened here. Someone was screaming, he could hear the burning pain in his voice. Panic rose in Lucas. He knew that this was not real, he knew that right now, he was sitting in a park in Antwerp, but if it was not real, why did it feel so real?</p><p>He looked around, scanning his environment for a source that the scream could have come from, but there was no one around him that made a scared impression, all of the people around him were enjoying themselves- “It’s not real,” Lucas whispered to himself, “You’re not in the Netherlands, they aren’t here.”</p><p>Jens. The name burned in Lucas’ mind, what if he would find out about it. He would hate him. The other ones would hate him if they knew. Lucas bit his tongue, trying not to think about. What happened and what he had done, they couldn’t know about it. He tasted blood and the pain in his mouth made him think a bit clearer, letting the images in his mind go away, having them disappear in the background a bit more. </p><p>But now, there was a new worry. Having the others finding out about what had happened. They would not understand why he had acted that way. His life here would go down and he would be left here with nothing.</p><p> </p><p>Thursday 09:56<br/>“So what can we conclude out of today’s lesson?” The history teacher was looking at his class and Lucas needed to yawn. During the last night, he couldn’t fall asleep once again, he was basically running on coffee now and he just wanted to rest his head on the table and sleep through all of his classes. </p><p>Some girl started an endless monologue and he leaned his head back, staring at point on the white ceiling. He took a deep breath, trying to get oxygen in his bloodstream. He needed to concentrate on the class, bad grades wouldn’t make all of this easier. </p><p>“Lucas, since you are more interested in the ceiling than in the conversation, I’m assuming that you will be happy to make some additions to what Marie just said?”  The teacher looked at him, tension in his voice and scanning Lucas’ face. A bitter feeling, like a stone, spread over Lucas. He had exactly no idea on what to answer, he didn’t even have an idea about what topic or decade they were talking about. “I think she said everything that I would consider important,” Lucas was surprised by the tremble in his voice. Since when was he this insecure when talking in front of his class?</p><p>The teacher gave him a disapproving gaze as he started to hand out papers to his classmates. “I want all of you to get familiar with the essay I just handed out and if there’s anything unclear, just write it down and we will work with the text on Monday,” around him, everyone else started packing up their books, making the classroom an uncoordinated mess. Lucas felt his head heavy and pain started overcoming him like a wave. He lifted a hand up, pressing on his temple while his other hand took his binder and started packing up so he could get to his next class. </p><p>“Lucas, would you mind staying a bit longer?” The way his teacher was looking at him made him feel uncomfortable, his eyes had something concerned, seeking for answers. Lucas didn’t want to stay longer, regardless of what the teacher wanted. “I need to get to my next class,” his eyes wandered to the door, wanting to leave since he had realised he was the only student left in class. </p><p>“I just wanted to check in with you. I know that all of these transitions might be hard for you right now, but you can’t just let yourself go in my class like that. When there are things happening in. Your outside of school, they stay outside of school Lucas, I don’t know if that was different at your old school, but I need you to show more performance in class. You can’t spend a whole class just staring at the ceiling,” Lucas swallowed, was this really necessary? He knew that he didn’t do what he could have done in class, but his head hurt from not getting enough sleep and he was worrying about bigger things than his grade in history. That his teacher had to point that out made him mad at himself. For sure, he could have done better, but how when live was already pressuring him so much? </p><p>Lucas nodded, trying not to show how much his teacher’s words had hurt him. “I’ll. Try to participate more, can I go now?” The teacher nodded and opened his mouth, probably saying something Lucas would never hear since he had grabbed his back and rushed out of the classroom. </p><p>Friday 17:44<br/>Lucas stood on top of the ramp, trying to find a way to not crash in to the other guys that were skating. The other boys were already sitting on top of a ramp on the other side of the park, but Lucas was practicing on one turn that he hadn’t quite gotten yet and his ambition was screaming at him to master it today. </p><p>He pushed himself down the ramp and could feel the concrete making his board tremble as he tried to balance out the ascent. This time, it seemed different than the few previous times he had tried, he realised as his feet suddenly started loosing contact with the board, which slit away, letting Lucas tumble and crash down on the hard ramp. It felt like someone had hammered a knife in his knee as it bumped on the floor, slightly jumping up as Lucas’ side hit the floor. </p><p>“Holy fuck man!,” the voice seemed a bit far away, like someone had wrapped him in cotton. Lucas did his best to push himself of the cold grey floor, feeling a pound in his right knee. He took a sharp breath in, trying to see what was going on around him. A few unknown faces were looking at him, concerned, probably trying to figure out what he had just done. “Are you okay?” A guy, probably three or four years older than him was looking at him: “That fall looked really painful, do you need any help?”<br/>“He’s with us, thanks mate,” Jens’ hand grabbed Lucas by his arm and slightly pulled him out of the way. “Can you walk?” The concern in his voice made Lucas’ stomach cramp up, he didn’t wanted Jens to worry about him. “Oh yes, don’t worry,” the taller boy pulled him up from the ground, having one hand laying on Lucas’ lower back so he wouldn’t fall over once again. Tears were creeping up his throat, burning in his eyes as he put weight on the knee. The pain wasn’t burning, but almost cutting through his joints. He realised that the knee of his trousers was gone and the fabric around it started to take a deep red colour. “Are you sure it’s okay?” Lucas tried to take deep breaths, chasing away to need to cry, taking a soft step. It still hurt like hell, but the pain now was not as cutting, more like a dull pressure pushing on his knee and trying to stop him from walking.  He took another step forward, taking his skateboard and looking over his shoulder into Jens’ eyes, “It works out fine, but thank you,” Jens squeezed his hand while they were walking over to the boys, letting it go right before they came into the sight of Sander, Robbe, Aaron and Moyo. </p><p>“Are you still alive? I wish I would have gotten a video of that, the view was worth gold, also Jens, I didn’t know you were considering nurse as one of your future jobs,” he wasn’t a hundred percent sure, but he could have sworn that Robbe had just punched Moyo for that comment. Robbe’s gaze wandered over to him. “Do you have water or something? You should probably wash out the graze,” Robbe pointed at the bleeding knee. Aaron held up the half empty tin can of beer, reaching towards him “I somewhere read that beer can sanitise, do you want?” “Dude, beer is also sticky, I don’t think we should just dump it over his knee, also, I payed for that,” Moyo was taking the can away, having Aaron chase him for it. </p><p>“Don’t you have to go?” Lucas had cleaned out his knee and was now sitting on the floor, observing Sander sketching out Robbe’s silhouette while Jens was pointing at the clock on his phone. “You want to get rid of me, don’t you?” “Yeah, that’s why I’m going to go with you to make sure you don’t die on the way, your dutch friends will probably kill all of us,” What was he doing? Did he want to make all of it more obvious than Lucas already thought it was?</p><p>“Huh, since when do we bring our friends to the train station?” Moyo and Sander were both staring at them. “Dumbasses, I have to pick up Lotte anyways and I don’t think that either of you want to have Lucas die right here because he gets, I don’t know, rabies or something,” Lucas had grabbed his bag as he stood up, still trying not to load his knee too much. </p><p>They had left the park, leaving the boys out of sight as Jens stopped. “Are we going to talk about it?” Lucas was feeling bad, knowing that he made Jens worry about him, feeling bad for him. He didn’t want that, he had enough of others suffering from what he was doing. “Talk about what?” Jens raised an eyebrow: “Lucas, don’t fucking act like it’s nothing, I know that there’s something up.” </p><p>Lucas started walking again, feeling Jens’ firm grip on his wrist, pulling him back. “Stop avoiding to talk about it, you are not making it any better Luc. You literally look like you haven’t slept in two years and you can’t tell me you would have fallen down like this if you would have been concentrated,” it made him mad, why did it matter to Jens? Why did he need to know everything? </p><p>“Why do you care Jens? Even if there was something, it’s my problem and not yours,” Lucas knew that his eyes were telling the truth, a thin layer of tears made them glance, but he just couldn’t talk about it, he couldn’t do anything to make his life better now. He had figured out that he needed to see a different place and that’s the only thing that mattered now, he didn’t want to have all of this affecting his life here. </p><p>On the other side, Jens was now staring at him. “How could I not care Lucas, I told you that I like you and seeing you like this, I can’t do that Lucas. Jana and I didn’t talk about our problems either and see how it ended. I mean, we are still friends, but I don’t want this to end. Please Lucas, just talk to me, whatever it is, we will figure it out!” </p><p>Lucas swallowed. Did he just compare him to his ex? Did he really do that? “Fuck Jens, I am not Jana.” He tore his wrist out of Jens grab, feeling tears running up his throat. “I am not your ex and if I say that there’s nothing, it’s none of your fucking business,” Lucas was surprised by how loud his voice was, breaking as he was nearly screaming at the taller boy. He could feel a stream of tears running down his cheeks as turned around, wanting to leave. </p><p>“Fuck Lucas, I did not mean that, I just want to help you.” Jens voice was calm, but he could still hear pain in it. It broke his heart, but all of this was too much for him. Lucas looked down on the floor, mumbling a short “Sorry, I have a train to catch,” and started walking away, tears filling his face. </p><p>“Wait!” Jens’ screams were echoing down the street and Lucas wanted to yell into the void, trying to get rid of the pain his heart was feeling right now. His face was wet, the salty tears were burning and Lucas couldn’t help himself but simmer out of pain. His world seemed to be colliding.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. six</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: self harm, anxiety?</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Saturday 20:16<br/>The kitchen floor was cold, on the ceiling, he could see the leftover spots of a colour bomb he had thrown at his dad when he had been seven. The white ceiling with the pale, bleached out blue spots was the only thing Lucas was looking at, it was the only thing in his eye sight, alternating with his blinks that made everything go dark for a second. He hadn’t left his families’ house since he had arrived yesterday evening, he had locked himself in, never wanting to go out again. </p><p>He was feeling like shit, being back didn’t make it better. He was home now, but what was home without his people around him, without feeling comfortable?</p><p>His phone buzzed, Kes was calling him. He sighed. Going out with his friends wouldn’t fix anything, but there was at least a slight possibility that he would get on other thoughts. “Hey dude, we are standing right in front of you door and we rang the bell like ten times by now, are you even here?” “Fuck you did?” Lucas stood up, opening the door.</p><p>“What the fuck Lucas, are you so stoned that you didn’t hear the freaking door?” Jayden and Kes looked at him and once again, there was this concern, this worry in the way they spoke, It was driving him insane. “Why is everyone worrying so much about me? I am old enough, even if I would have smoked thirty joints, it would be none of your fucking business. I was painting and got lost in my thoughts, okay?” </p><p>Kes lifted his hands, “Slow down, since when aren’t you allowed to worry about your friends anymore Lucas?” He was feeling like shit again. Why did he just attack his friends? Why was he doing any of this anyways? “Fuck, I’m sorry, it’s just-“ Lucas wanted to apologise, explain everything, but he couldn’t tell them, all of it was too hard for him right now. “It’s just that you have a wife and three children in Belgium and you miss them,” Jayden patted on his back and Lucas’ needed to smile, probably for the first time in the last twenty-four hour. “Yes, my wife and I just bought stocks from apple and I’m thinking about what I could invest in next,” “Okay Mr. Business man, are we going to that party now? Don’t worry about it Lucas, all of us have a bad day, even if it’s because of your wife you didn’t tell us about yet,” Lucas pulled the door closed behind him, making sure that he had his keys.</p><p>“I really missed you dorks.” He knew that this wasn’t a solution, but with a sad smile, he realised that his friends really made him feel better and was happy to have them right now, even if they didn’t knew about his struggles.</p><p>Sunday 17:32<br/>Lucas put his headphones in is ears, trying to ignore the other passengers around him. He had the most enormous headache of his life, his hangover from yesterday was killing him and he still couldn’t stop thinking. He knew that all the weed and alcohol wouldn’t made anything better, but yesterday, he had only been looking for a quick way to numb all of his worries and it had worked out for at least the evening.</p><p>He wasn’t really paying attention to his environment, so he didn’t notice the boy with the dark hair until ran into him. “Fuck I’m sorry,” Lucas heard his voice and wanted to run off, he couldn’t talk with Jens after what had happened on Friday. Lucas knew that he had probably overacted, but all of it was stressing him out and he really needed time to think, especially since his great plan, going to the Netherlands and just forgetting all of his worries </p><p>“Hi, I didn’t know that you were here,” Jens made a horrible impression, he seemed like he wasn’t sleeping a lot either, dark shadows under his puffy and swollen eyes. It broke his heart, Lucas couldn’t see him like this, probably because of what he had done on Friday. Why was he just realising that now? He knew it, he knew that every time he was attaching to someone, he ended up having them hurt. “Luc, I am sorry about Friday, I really didn’t want to push you to do anything,” Lucas could see the gazes of people on the street trying to see what was happening between them and it made him uncomfortable. Wasn’t the whole situation already tight enough?</p><p>“Jens, I…” he couldn’t wrap his mind about what he wanted to say. Lucas wanted to tell him that he was sorry, that he really was mad at himself for always making every relationship go like this. “Lucas, you haven ignored my texts the whole weekend, I was so worried,” Jens had grabbed his wrist, he seemed to have a thing with doing that and stared at him. Everything in him was screaming at him to just leave. “Can we talk about it?” “I have to get home, my dad’s going to kill me if I’m too late, he doesn’t see me much around anyways,” “Lucas don’t run away now, if you need to get home, I’ll just walk the way with you, but I feel like we should really talk about it if we want us to work out.” </p><p>He was unsure, he wanted them to work out, Lucas clearly did, but the visit in the Netherlands hadn’t made anything better, he wasn’t good at all and seeing the other boy hurt by his actions only made it worse. Everything he wanted was to build up a wall, not letting his feelings influence him like they were right now and not hurting other people anymore. Jens seemed to notice that he was loosing himself in his thoughts, at least that’s what Lucas assumed as he felt Jens’ hand on his shoulder. It made him draw back, knowing that there  were people around them. “Don’t-“ Jens gave him a frowning gaze, but le his hand sink down. “What is wrong, is it really that bad that there are people watching us right now? Lucas, I want this, I want to be with you and I don’t. Care about what they think. Can’t you give it a try?” </p><p>Strangers were looking at them and his pulse was rising. Lucas didn’t want any of this right now. He wanted to go home and bury himself in his bed to get high or drunk or just sleep, but he didn’t want to talk about it, not here. Jens made him vulnerable, he realised as he walked down the street, staring at the street in front of him. All of it had come back after him and Jens had gotten close. Jens wasn’t the problem, no, but Lucas was now convinced that he just couldn’t have other people close to him, that that was what made him struggle and hurt them. </p><p>And he didn’t want to hurt anyone. His gaze shifted over to Jens, the Belgian guy was staring at the floor, his shoulders hunched up, drowning in the dark red fabric of his hoodie and his skin  pale. Lucas bit his tongue, he needed to end this, he couldn’t harm him more than this, it was eating him from the inside and even if it would hurt, it was better for everyone, wasn’t it? </p><p>With a small glance, he checked if there was anyone around them. The street seemed to had cleared, so Lucas stopped, taking a deep breath and facing the taller boy to his side. “Jens… I“ he didn’t want to do this, his heart was  screaming at him to find another way, but he had at least partly convinced himself that he could avoid more pain by ending whatever had been going on between both of  them. </p><p>“I can’t do this, I am sorry,” a giant ball of tears had build in his throat and he tried not to show the battle inside of him. Jens facial expression seemed to change rapidly as the words reached him. Disbelieve was flooding his face, mixed with something Lucas guessed was pain and concern. “Lucas, what are you talking about?” “All of this” he pointed Jens, “Us, it doesn’t work okay? I thought would, but I can’t do it.” His eyes were burning and he tried to swallow down the pain.</p><p>“What are you talking about? Because of that thing on Friday? I told you I didn’t mean it Luc, and if there is something else I did, we can work it out okay? I want this to work and. If there is something you can’t tell me right now, it’s fine,” he had taken a step towards him, which made it harder for Lucas than it already was. He didn’t want it, but he just couldn’t think of another way to make things work for him and Jens being so perfect even while he was hurt made him even angrier at himself. </p><p>“That’s the problem Jens,” was he really going to do this? Was he really going to destroy all of it just because he couldn’t handle his own problems anymore?  “I didn’t mean any of it. I thought I would, but I don’t. I can’t do this. I can’t be with some boy I have known for less than two months. I played with you and I am sorry, but it never meant anything to me and if it did to you, I am sorry that I fooled you,”  Lucas could see something shifting in Jens. “You…” his voice was trembling and Lucas just wanted to run away. </p><p>He turned around, mumbling an unclear “Sorry,”  and started making his way home, leaving Jens standing on the sidewalk. Tears ran down his face now, he had probably destroyed the only thing that had mattered here, believing that this was the solution to his problem and he regretted it but if it could help him to get better, he needed to take his chance, even if it felt like someone had just stabbed his heart with a knife. His whole body was shaking as he ran away, his lungs were burning and the salty taste of his own tears made everything worse.</p><p> </p><p>Thursday 23:56<br/>The harsh light of the bathroom made him look worse than he already did. Or at least that was what Lucas thought. He had barely left his room since Sunday afternoon, he had told his dad that he wasn’t feeling well, he hadn’t charged his phone and had probably missed out on at least thirty texts from his friends and he couldn’t even think about going to school right now. He had tried to do something, just think of something else than the pain in Jens’ eyes, but exactly that and the various flashbacks that had gotten worse were the two things that his mind was spiralling around. </p><p>He had tried to do something productive, he had tried to sketch something to get on other thoughts, but the only things that he had been able to draw were places that he connected with Jens, the café, the bridge he could see from his window and the skatepark. Everything around him reminded him of the Belgian right now and he regretted everything. </p><p>Now he was staring at his own face in the mirror in front of him and he was shocked, not recognising himself anymore. His eyes were red, swollen. The fact that he hadn’t been able to close his eyes to get any rest had given him dark, almost black rings under his eyes, his hair was stiff and greasy, without any hanging in his eyes. The dirty hoodie he was wearing swallowed him, made him drown in the fabric like he was drowning in his feelings. He couldn’t handle this, he couldn’t handle any of it anymore. It was too much. Who was the boy in the mirror? What had he thought? Why did he need to hurt Jens even more than he already did? It clearly hadn’t had any good effects, it hadn’t helped him and it hadn’t improved his situation, it had only made it worse. <br/>Lucas gaze was fixed at the boy in the mirror, feeling nothing but hate and anger for him. Why was he like that? Why was he destroying everything touched, thinking it would make anything better? It clearly didn’t. </p><p>The anger overtook him. A sudden pain bursted through him as the glass of the mirror shattered and shards fell down on the floor, making him flinch. It took him second to realise that he was the reason for it. That he had just punched the boy that was crying in the mirror. Lucas could feel warm blood starting to drip down his hands as he turned them around, seeing the tiny and painful cuts in his knuckles. Little pieces on glass were sparkling in the wounds and he couldn’t believe what he had just done. </p><p>“Lucas?” The door to the room opened and his dad entered, stopping a glimpse seeing the mess Lucas had just made. “The hell did you do?” He flinched, he didn’t want any trouble with his dad and now his dad was seeing him like this, crying and having a break down. He sank down on the cold bathroom floor and couldn’t help himself but bury his head on his knees, his face soaking wet from tears. </p><p>His dad’s facial expression was something Lucas couldn’t define, he’d only seen a glimpse of it and what he’d seen made Lucas scared. His dad seemed confused, mad and probably concerned, but Lucas would have lied if he said that he’d be able to tell what his dad was feeling, but Lucas was sure that his dad wasn’t happy with the circumstances. “I don’t know,” his voice was shaking as his dad pressed a towel on his knuckles. “Don’t explain yourself, we can do that later, but right now we got to save your hand and get you to the hospital, it really doesn’t look like we can handle it here.” </p><p>Friday 11:08<br/>It felt like someone took instant-glue and stuck his eyelids together as Lucas was trying to open his eyes. Some invisible weight was pushing him into scratchy covers and he heard voices, muffled by a light blue door to his right. He tried to remember how he had gotten here and a few blurry memories from last night started showing up in his head. The mirror, this creeping feeling in his chest, the anger he felt and the sharp edges in his knuckles. He tried to move his right hand, pushing the covers down just to see it wrapped it partly wrapped in white bandages layered with a blue splint. </p><p>Lucas would have lied if he had said his hand didn’t hurt, the tight feeling in his knuckles, making him feel like he couldn’t move his hand at all. He tried making a fist and he could feel the. Strings in his hands pulling against the movement, the pain and the pressure cutting through the back of his hand. He flinched, not expecting it to feel that horrible. Already exhausted, Lucas let himself sink back into the small pillow on his back, staring at the blank ceiling of his hospital room. </p><p>The door to his room swung open and two men in scrubs entered the room, one of them carrying a light pink folder. Behind them, Lucas saw his dad entering the room, looking all tired and exhausted, carrying one of  Lucas’ own backpacks in his hand. </p><p>Keeping space between them, his dad placed the bag besides the bed. “Hey bud, I didn’t know what clothes you needed, so I just threw a few thing in there. I hope you can find something to wear in there, I just didn’t want you to wear that dirty hoodie again.” Lucas was watching his dad turning away from him, like he didn’t really wanted to be in this room with his son right now. The cellphone of his dad rang and his dad mumbled a quick “Sorry,” leaving the room so that Lucas was left with the two men he assumed to be staff of the hospital. </p><p>“So Lucas, it’s nice to see you awake, I mean you slept for almost ten hours. My name is Doctor Jannsens and I’m basically just here to explain to you what happened with your hand and give you a few advices for the following weeks since your dad has already signed your release papers.” The guy with the folder had come closer to him opening up the folder and pulling put an x-ray. </p><p>“This is basically your hand right now, as you can see, the metacarpal in you small finger is broken, you see, this little line shows it,” with a pen, Doctor Jannsens pointed at the bone in his hand, “This is called boxer’s fracture and it usually doesn’t need surgery but now it’s really important that you wear the splint all the time so it can heal properly. Do you understand me so far?” Lucas’ head was spinning, the amount of information was already overwhelming him and his head started slightly pounding again but he nodded. “This kind of fracture is not that uncommon when you punch something and we are optimistic that it’s going to heal properly if you don’t strain it again. Your were lucky and we could get all the glass out of your hand, but you’ll have to observe the cuts a bit so that they heal properly. They will most definitely leave scars there, so just so you knew that.”<br/>Lucas was trying to process everything as the doctor just carried on talking, “My colleague who admitted you last night also noted that you were overly exhausted, that’s actually the main reason why we kept you here. We need to make sure that you’d get at least some rest and we needed to talk to you in a better state. We’re giving you a few pain meds to take home with you, but only take them when you really need to.”<br/>The doctor took a long breath, his eyes resting on Lucas who was still trying to process everything, asking himself questions again. Now that he had gotten rest and his mind started working a bit rational again, he couldn’t believe what he had done. </p><p>“Lucas, I know that this could be a lot of information, but we need to inform you so you can go home.” Lucas slowly nodded, staring into the emptiness of the hospital room. “And Lucas, it’s not my job to tell you this, but according to your dad, you aren’t a person who gets really aggressive, so he has been asking himself why you would get just so angry. I don’t know you, but I honestly just wanted to tell you that there are always people out there who will listen to you and make you feel at least a tiny bit better. Take career okay?”</p><p>The doctor left and Lucas was left a bit confused by the whole speech as he briefly opened the bag his dad had left next to him, pulling out some jeans and a hoodie and put them on carefully. After he got out of the dirty hoodie that he tossed back in the bag, looking for his phone. It took him a minute to realised that it was laying under his bed and that he hadn’t charged it since Sunday evening. </p><p>He rolled his eyes, thinking about how stupid he was. The words of doctor Janssens came back to his mind the same moment the door opened and his dad came in: “Let’s get you back home Luc.” </p><p>Friday 20:45<br/>Lucas was staring at the ceiling, not wanting to look at his phone. He had fished it from under his bed when he had gotten home, but by now he hadn’t had found the energy to check it. He turned to his stomach, resting his head on the pillow under his chin. A wave of air left his nose as he reached for his phone, pulling it away from the charger. </p><p>He started turning his phone in his hand, relining the strikes of the white Sharpie he had used to draw different patterns on the case. With his left thumb, he pressed the power bottom on the side of his phone, just to let it fall down on his mattress. He wasn’t sure wether or not he wanted to know wether or not he wanted to know if anyone actually cared about him and thinking about having to answer messages while he wasn’t quite sure what he was feeling right now made him feel stressed out. What was he supposed to say to his friends back in Utrecht? And what would Noor and Britt think about him? What was he supposed to tell them as a reason for not coming to school for an entire week?</p><p>Even with all those questions in the back of his head, Lucas unlocked the phone. His heartbeat rose as he saw a numerous amount of texts lighting up. Kes, Britt and Jayden had all texted him multiple times, Noor and Isa had both called him several times, adding up to about fifty texts from each one and, to his surprise, Moyo had send him one text, asking wether or not he wanted to join the boys for a party the next day. </p><p>Lucas was staring at the letters on his screen. How could it be that Jens hadn’t told his friends about what had happened? If he would have, Moyo most definitely wouldn’t have invited him to the party. </p><p>Without thinking about what he was doing anymore, Lucas opened instagram and was suddenly on Jens’ instagram, staring at the pictures of the other boy, sighing that he couldn’t let go of thinking about him.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>